Recent Years Saw Increase in U.S. Pregnancy-Related Deaths

FRIDAY, April 18, 2025 (HealthDay News) — During 2018 to 2022, pregnancy-related deaths in the United States increased, according to a study published online April 9 in JAMA Network Open.

Yingxi Chen, M.D., Ph.D., from the National Cancer Institute in Rockville, Maryland, and colleagues examined the age-standardized national rates of pregnancy-related death from 2018 to 2022 in the United States using data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention”s Wide-Ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research.

There were 6,283 pregnancy-related deaths, including 1,891 late maternal deaths during 2018 to 2022. The researchers found that there was an increase in the age-standardized annual and aggregated rate of pregnancy-related mortality (ASR) by 27.7 percent from 2018 to 2022 (25.3 to 32.6 deaths per 100,000 live births). The increase was seen across age groups and was disproportionately driven by deaths among women aged 25 to 39 years (by 36.8 percent). Considerable variation was seen in rates by state, from 18.5 to 59.7 deaths per 100,000 live births. Overall, 2,679 pregnancy-related deaths could have been prevented from 2018 to 2022 if the national rate was reduced to the lowest state rate. The highest ASR was seen in American Indian and Alaska Native women, followed by non-Hispanic Black women (106.3 and 76.9 deaths per 100,000 live births, respectively). Mental and behavior disorders and drug-induced and alcohol-induced death were important contributing causes of late maternal death, although cardiovascular disease was the leading cause of the overall pregnancy-related deaths.

“Our analysis provides important insights that should inform the shared goal of preventing avoidable pregnancy-related deaths in the United States,” the authors write.

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