Ohio History Journal

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KRISTE LINDENMEYER

KRISTE LINDENMEYER

 

Saving Mothers and Babies: The

Sheppard-Towner Act in Ohio,

1921-1929

 

In 1985 (the year for which the latest statistics are available), 10.6

American babies died for every 1,000 live births in the United States.

This is a dramatic improvement over the country's 1921 infant mortal-

ity rate of 76 per 1,000, but as in 1921, the United States' rate continues

to compare poorly with many other industrialized countries. In 1921,

the United States rate ranked seventeenth out of twenty "modern"

nations.1 The 1985 rate placed the U.S. eighteenth, and a Children's

Defense Fund report contends that, contrary to popular opinion, infant

mortality is actually worsening in some categories. Dr. Marsden

Wagner, director of the World Health Organization's maternal and

child health program, maintains that "infant mortality is not a health

problem ... [but] ... a social problem" which should be addressed

through "more social education for families" and by insuring that the

"basic level of financial and social support ... be provided to families. "2

But, his is not a new idea. In 1921, the United States Congress passed

legislation designed to attack the country's high infant mortality rate by

"promoting" better prenatal and infant care.

The Sheppard-Towner Maternity and Infancy Act was passed in 1921

as the first federal health care legislation to "promote the welfare" and

prevent unnecessary deaths of mothers and babies in America.3

 

 

 

Kriste Lindenmeyer is a Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of Cincinnati.

 

1. For a comprehensive list of the nations cited in the 1921 Congressional Hearing on

Sheppard-Towner, see Promotion of the Welfare and Hygiene of Maternity and Infancy:

The Administration of the Act of Congress of November 21, 1921, Fiscal Year

Ended June 30, 1929, (Washington, D.C., 1931), Children's Bureau Publication

(CB pub.) No. 203, 139.

2. Associated Press, "High Infant-death Rate in U.S. Blamed on Skimpy Social

Help," Cincinnati Enquirer, 3 February 1988, sec. B, p.8; see also Children's Defense

Fund, A Children's Budget: An Analysis of Our Nation's Investment in Children,

(Washington, D.C., 1988), 61-62.

3. The Sheppard-Towner Act passed the U.S. Senate by a vote of 63-7 on July 22,

1921. An amended version passed the House on November 21, 1921, by a vote of 279-39.