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The United Nations – A striking new report, written by US agencies and public health experts, highlights one of the biggest threats facing newborns around the world: being born with low birth weight. The report, published today in the British medical journal The Lancet Global Health, indicates that 80% of the 2.5 million newborns who die each year in the world suffer from low birth weight – a terrible trend that researchers think that it can be changed.
Significantly, although three-quarters of low-birth-weight babies were born in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, the problem remains "significant" in high-income countries of Europe, the United States, and the United States. North America (including the United States), Australia and New Zealand. the research paper says. The study was written by experts from the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Children's Agency, UNICEF, and the World Health Organization. London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.
Millions of babies at risk
Worldwide, 20.5 million babies are born each year with low birth weight, defined as weighing less than 2,500 grams or 5.5 pounds. That's 1 in 7 babies in the world. And this is not just a problem in poor countries.
"High-income countries have hardly progressed," says the study, and the rate of underweight birth observed in the United States has worsened over the past year. five-year period (2000-2015) covered by the research. The report collected birth weight data on 281 million births in 148 US member states.
The researchers note that they have not undertaken to examine the causes of the problem. But they conclude that, in high-income and middle-income countries, "factors such as maternal obesity, noncommunicable diseases, higher maternal age, medically unspecified caesarean sections, and high blood pressure". Increasing use of fertility treatments are potential factors to deal with, "according to Professor Joy E. Lawn, lead author of the report.
In low-income settings, these same factors need to be taken into account, but there are also "interventions to address teenage pregnancy, maternal infections such as malaria and HIV, factors such as as exposure to indoor air pollution, "said Lawn, director of reproductive and child health for teen mothers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.
"Low birth weight is probably the only information about you that most predicts your health over the course of your life," Lawn added in a phone call with reporters. She called it "the center of our vision of transforming the world".
Reduce intergenerational poverty
Another reason why it is so vital to tackle this problem, she said, is that it "affects the onset of chronic diseases in the adult, who is an epidemic in the world … that perpetuates intergenerational poverty. "
Let's be clear: thanks to the awareness of nutrition and maternal and newborn health, average birth weight has increased in many developed countries. In the United States and Canada, for example, the birth weight of newborns has increased for decades and has stabilized only in recent years, reported Today's Parent, a Canadian journal.
But the dilemma of babies with low birth weight persists and the way a child advances on his way to adulthood remains thorny. In richer developed countries, infant mortality has declined, but an American child is 70% more likely to to die before adulthood that in other developed countries, the Health Affairs Journal revealed in January 2018. And this new study shows that low-birth-weight newborns continue to pose problems in the United States.
Hannah Blencowe, first author of the report, told CBS News: "In the United States, your pre-term birth rate is very high." She said that many of the problems in the United States are due, among other things, to a high rate of medically unnecessary caesarean sections.
"The other problem with the United States is the great inequality," said Blencowe. "If you look at the different ethnic groups and their geographic distribution, which we did earlier, with regard to premature births, there is a large gap between the white middle class and African groups. [American] and Hispanic groups in other parts of the United States "
These underserved groups "face the same problems as low-income countries, lacking access to health care," she said, adding that the problem could be solved with investments.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) provided US data for the report and reviewed the overall findings. Not surprisingly, the CDC found similar trends in the years following the end of the data in this study. In 2015, the rate of low birth weight babies increased to 6.34% among single births (as opposed to twins or multiple births) in the United States, and in 2016, it rose again to reach 6.44%. These increases reversed the trend observed between 2006 and 2014.
"This is a wake up call"
Dr. Mercedes De Onis, co-author of The Lancet study, said that the number of neonatal deaths in infants with low birth weight could – and should – be reduced. According to Lawn, the WHO's Global Nutrition Plan aims to reduce low birth weight newborns by 30% between 2012 and 2025, but said that "progress is really slow in high-income country ".
Dr. Victor Aguayo, head of global nutrition at UNICEF, said the bulk of his work "focuses on low and middle income countries because it is there that 90% of cases of low birth weight occur.
"It is a call to governments, the United States and all partners to fill three gaps," said Lawn, highlighting three areas to consider:
- Care gap – 20.5 million low birth weight babies are at risk of inadequate care.
- Prevention gap – Increase progress to reduce the rate of babies with low birth weight.
- Data gap – All babies must be weighed at birth and the data recorded in national registers.
"We owe it to all the newborns in the world, to their families and to all countries to fill these three gaps" to "end this wave of health problems," said Lawn.
"The most vulnerable babies should not be left behind," the report concludes.
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