The maternal death rate in the United States has jumped nearly 27 percent from 2000 to 2014.
According to a study published online Monday in the science journal Obstetrics & Gynecology, the death rate of women during or within 42 days of pregnancy is higher than previously believed, HealthDay reported.
Researchers said they found that by 2014 almost 24 women die for every 100,000 live births, higher than the 19 women per 100,000 births in 2000.
"Certainly, maternal death is still a rare event," the study's lead researcher Marian MacDorman, of the University of Maryland, told HealthDay. "But it's of great concern that the rate is not improving – it's increasing. Our study couldn't get into the causes of death. We were just trying to get at the numbers."
According to Medscape, the study stated that California was the only state to show a declining maternal death rate in a study of 48 states and the District of Columbia.
Medscape stated that the new study comes from a new analytical model that compensates for deficits in the collection of maternal mortality statistics in various states.
"[I]n any given data year, some states were using the U.S. standard question, others were using questions incompatible with the U.S. standard, and still others had no pregnancy question on their death certificates," the authors wrote about collecting the new data.
Researchers said that because of the varying standards, the U.S. had not produced an official maternal mortality rate since 2007, and called it an "international embarrassment."
"Clearly at a time when the World Health Organization reports that 157 of 183 countries studied had decreases in maternal mortality between 2000 and 2013, the U.S. maternal mortality rate is moving in the wrong direction," researchers said.
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