Each year the March of Dimes publishes a Prematurity Report Card to measure the progress states are making toward a preterm birth rate of 9.6% or less by the year 2020. On the 2013 Report Card the United States received a “C”, and we still have the highest rate of preterm birth of any developed country.
Looking at individual states reveals interesting regional trends in prematurity. In North Carolina and Wisconsin, for example, the preterm birth rate is 12% and 10.5% respectively. There is also a clear racial disparity in prematurity in these states: for white infants, the preterm birth rate is 10.7% (NC) and 10.2% (WI), while black preterm infants represent 17.1% (NC) and 16.0% (WI) of all live births. While there are a number of biological and social factors that contribute to prematurity, two of the most telling are smoking and insurance coverage. In North Carolina, 22.4% of women are smokers and 23.8% are uninsured, while in Wisconsin 24.1% are smokers but only 11.8% are uninsured.
The state with the best report card this year was Vermont, whose preterm birth rate is already below the March of Dimes goal at 8.7%. The state with the worst report card is Mississippi, where preterm infants represent 17.1% of all live births.
The LRN Group 