> In the United States, all infants who show signs of life at birth (take a breath, move voluntarily, have a heartbeat) are considered alive.
> In Belgium and France — in fact, in most European Union countries — any baby born before 26 weeks gestation is not considered alive and therefore does not “count” against reported infant mortality rates.
The baby at issue here would have been just under 22 weeks. (France changed their standard in 2008-2009; their page defining stillbirth ( http://www.insee.fr/en/methodes/default.asp?page=definitions... ) now includes a warning that French numbers cannot be compared to other European neonatal mortality numbers, so it seems safe to assume the rest of Europe has carried on as before.)
> According to the way statistics are calculated in Canada, Germany, and Austria, a premature baby weighing <500g is not considered a living child.
The article baby weighed well over 500g. But this is quite relevant to the question of who has better neonatal mortality.
> In Switzerland and other parts of Europe, a baby born who is less than 30 centimeters long is not counted as a live birth. Therefore, unlike in the U.S., such high-risk infants cannot affect Swiss infant mortality rates.
This baby's length is not reported, so this is of questionable relevance to this particular baby. But, again, it remains very relevant to the question of "do countries like Finland, France, and Cuba have better neonatal mortality than the US?"
> If a child in Hong Kong or Japan is born alive but dies within the first 24 hours of birth, he or she is reported as a “miscarriage” and does not affect the country’s reported infant mortality rates.
This could be a non-premature, 8-pound baby!
> Efforts to salvage these tiny babies reflect this classification. Since 2000, 42 of the world’s 52 surviving babies weighing less than 400g (0.9 lbs.) were born in the United States.
Still think "USD-tinted healthcare analytics" biases you against saving premature babies?
Full disclosure: I'm with your parent; I consider spending so much pumping life into these very premature "babies" a self-aggrandizing waste of time, effort, and money. But your comment seems to be grotesquely misinformed.
The article you quote is out of date. Many of the countries mentioned, like Germany and Austria, are self-aggrandizingly wasting time and tax money pumping life into <500g babies regardless of whether the law considers these living children or not. After all it's the doctor who makes the call, not a lawyer.
You can verify this by looking at the Tiniest Babies Registry [1], which was also mentioned in the article (those 52 surviving babies -- but the toll today is already at 155). The numbers are not so skewed towards the US as they were in 2008. In recent years, about half of these tiny babies were born in Europe, Japan or South Korea.
From 2008: http://pjmedia.com/blog/the-doctor-is-in-infant-mortality-co...
Some (OK, rather extensive) points from the link:
> In the United States, all infants who show signs of life at birth (take a breath, move voluntarily, have a heartbeat) are considered alive.
> In Belgium and France — in fact, in most European Union countries — any baby born before 26 weeks gestation is not considered alive and therefore does not “count” against reported infant mortality rates.
The baby at issue here would have been just under 22 weeks. (France changed their standard in 2008-2009; their page defining stillbirth ( http://www.insee.fr/en/methodes/default.asp?page=definitions... ) now includes a warning that French numbers cannot be compared to other European neonatal mortality numbers, so it seems safe to assume the rest of Europe has carried on as before.)
> According to the way statistics are calculated in Canada, Germany, and Austria, a premature baby weighing <500g is not considered a living child.
The article baby weighed well over 500g. But this is quite relevant to the question of who has better neonatal mortality.
> In Switzerland and other parts of Europe, a baby born who is less than 30 centimeters long is not counted as a live birth. Therefore, unlike in the U.S., such high-risk infants cannot affect Swiss infant mortality rates.
This baby's length is not reported, so this is of questionable relevance to this particular baby. But, again, it remains very relevant to the question of "do countries like Finland, France, and Cuba have better neonatal mortality than the US?"
> If a child in Hong Kong or Japan is born alive but dies within the first 24 hours of birth, he or she is reported as a “miscarriage” and does not affect the country’s reported infant mortality rates.
This could be a non-premature, 8-pound baby!
> Efforts to salvage these tiny babies reflect this classification. Since 2000, 42 of the world’s 52 surviving babies weighing less than 400g (0.9 lbs.) were born in the United States.
Still think "USD-tinted healthcare analytics" biases you against saving premature babies?
Full disclosure: I'm with your parent; I consider spending so much pumping life into these very premature "babies" a self-aggrandizing waste of time, effort, and money. But your comment seems to be grotesquely misinformed.