Billboards to battle infant mortality

By Jonathan Babalola
Diversity Institute fellow

03.14.06

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About 80 billboards throughout Davidson County will soon convey a grim message: The state's infant mortality rate is one of the worst in the country.

The Board of Public Health announced Tuesday that the billboards will be posted by the end of the month as part of an educational program promoting prenatal health care.

"Most people don't realize that our infant mortality rate is one of the worst in the country," Kimberlee Wyche-Etheridge, director of family, youth and infant health at the Metro Health Department, said. "We need to get this information out to people and start making a difference."

According to the Centers for Disease Control, infant mortality rates are determined by deaths of babies under one year of age for every 1,000 live births in a specified area.

Dr. Stefanie Bailey, the director of health for the Metro Health Department, said, "You have the numbers staring you right in the face," Bailey said. "You can't deny it."

According to statistics compiled by the C.D.C for 2003, Tennessee's rate of 9.3 deaths per 1,000 is the third worst in the country, after Mississippi and Louisiana.

One of the billboards will show an empty classroom with the message, "Every year in Davidson County, the number of babies that die could fill this classroom … and 3 more."

Bailey said she likes the approach of using the billboards, which cost the state 6,000.

"We're not a community that sits and waits for things to get absolutely worse," Bailey said. "We're getting better."

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