I. Maternal & Infant Mortality
CDC Maternal Mortality Data (2022)
22.3 maternal deaths per 100K in the US vs 0 in Norway
Official US maternal mortality statistics. The US rate is 22.3 deaths per 100,000 live births. Norway: zero. Sweden: 5. Finland: 3. Switzerland: 1.2.
The CDC tracks pregnancy-related deaths through state vital records, and the 2022 release put the national rate at 22.3 per 100,000 live births. To frame what that number means in international terms, Norway recorded zero maternal deaths that year. Sweden was at 5 per 100,000. Switzerland at 1.2.
The US rate sits closer to Iran and Ukraine than to its peer countries. The CDC counts deaths during pregnancy and within 42 days of birth from any cause related to or worsened by the pregnancy, which matches the WHO definition, so the comparison is honest.
One reasonable caveat: the US number partly reflects better tracking after 2018, when every state added a pregnancy checkbox to death certificates. Even adjusting for that, the rate is more than five times Sweden's. The number has been rising while every other rich country has been pushing theirs down.
22.3
US deaths per 100K live births (2022)
0
Norway, same year
5
Sweden, per 100K
1.2
Switzerland, per 100K
Why it matters
A mother giving birth in the US is more likely to die than one giving birth in nearly every other wealthy nation, and that gap is growing, not closing.
This is one finding from the research library behind How to Birth a Mother. Everything here traces back to a study, a dataset, or a systematic review.