COLUMBUS – Efforts to combat infant mortality in Ohio are bearing fruit but there is still a broad gap between the odds of white children making it to their first birthday and those of Black children.
A new report released by the Ohio Department of Health shows there were 356 Black infant deaths in 2019, an increase of 17 from 2018, though still lower than the years 2015-17.
However, racial disparities continue to widen, with Black infants being 2.8 times more likely to die than white infants. The number of white infants that died in 2019 was the lowest in 10 years.
“It’s just simply unacceptable. And, we can correct it, we can change it,” Gov. Mike DeWine said.
DeWine announced that he is establishing the Eliminating Racial Disparities in Infant Mortality Task Force to work with local, state, and national leaders to address racial disparities in infant mortality with the goal of eliminating racial disparities by 2030.
The infant mortality rate is the number of infant deaths per 1,000 live births. Ohio infant mortality across all races was 6.9 per 1,000 live births in 2019, the same as it was in 2018.
The Black infant mortality rate was 14.3 in 2019, up from 13.9 in 2018.
The Ohio and national goal is 6.0 or fewer infant deaths per 1,000 live births in every racial and ethnic group.