Speaking Of The Culture Of Life

NYTimes:

For decades, Mississippi and neighboring states with large black populations and expanses of enduring poverty made steady progress in reducing infant death. But, in what health experts call an ominous portent, progress has stalled and in recent years the death rate has risen in Mississippi and several other states.

The setbacks have raised questions about the impact of cuts in welfare and Medicaid and of poor access to doctors, and, many doctors say, the growing epidemics of obesity, diabetes and hypertension among potential mothers, some of whom tip the scales here at 300 to 400 pounds.
...
To the shock of Mississippi officials, who in 2004 had seen the infant mortality rate — defined as deaths by the age of 1 year per thousand live births — fall to 9.7, the rate jumped sharply in 2005, to 11.4. The national average in 2003, the last year for which data have been compiled, was 6.9. Smaller rises also occurred in 2005 in Alabama, North Carolina and Tennessee. Louisiana and South Carolina saw rises in 2004 and have not yet reported on 2005.

Whether the rises continue or not, federal officials say, rates have stagnated in the Deep South at levels well above the national average.
...
The overall jump in Mississippi meant that 65 more babies died in 2005 than in the previous year, for a total of 481.

In light of the recent SCOTUS decision upholding the ban on D&X procedures, I wondered what it would be like if we spent more time, energy and money on protecting children actually outside the womb.

It's hard to find any stats on exactly how many of these rather uncommon medical procedures take place, but it appears to be about 0.24 percent of all abortions.  The site I got that from indicated that was based on data from Virginia, which apparently is one of the few states that actually keep track of different methods of terminating pregnancy.

Now, according to the state of Mississippi there were 2956 abortions in 2005.  If that figure from VA holds true across the US (a not-entirely-reasonable assumption, but it's all I have to go on), that means all of about 7 pregnancies ended with a D&X (and we don't know during which trimester or the circumstances).  In other words, 65 more infants died than in the previous year due to our inability to provide good pre-natal healthcare and counseling, sufficient wages for pregnant mothers to eat right so they don't suffer from obesity and other related health problems, not to mention feed their kids well and get them to the doctor, etc, while Congress spent its time passing a law preventing without exception a procedure that is rare and could save the life of the mother.

That sure makes a hell of a lot of sense, don't it?

But statistics are impersonal.  These paragraphs smacked me, as they were supposed to:

The toll is visible in Hollandale, a tired town in the impoverished Delta region of northwest Mississippi.

Jamekia Brown, 22 and two months pregnant with her third child, lives next to the black people’s cemetery in the part of town called No Name, where multiple generations crowd into cheap clapboard houses and trailers.

So it took only a minute to walk to the graves of Ms. Brown’s first two children, marked with temporary metal signs because she cannot afford tombstones.

Bush said in his 2005 SOTU:

Because a society is measured by how it treats the weak and vulnerable, we must strive to build a culture of life.

Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin.

ntodd

PS--Vermont was #1 in the infant mortality category, with 4.7 deaths per 1000 live births.