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05/14/2012 Poverty and Health: A Connection We Can't Ignore
04/30/2012 Cardiac Care - A Case Study in Practice Variation
04/16/2012 One Courageous Woman
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In November 2010 we released an issue brief on the cost of prematurity in Michigan. In that issue brief we noted that in 2008/2009, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Michigan spent a total of more than $46 million on preterm infants in the first year of life. The average cost of medical care for a preterm baby in its first year of life was almost $42,000, compared to just over $4,000 for a full-term infant. In 2007, the March of Dimes published similar national numbers that set the medical cost of a preterm birth at $49,000.

In 2006, there were 4.3 million children born in the United States. Approximately 55,000 of those children were born prematurely. Premature births have been increasing consistently since 1990 (though there appears to have been a slight drop in the rate of prematurity in 2007). In 1990, 10.6 percent of children were born prematurely; in 2006, that percentage had increased to 12.8 (preliminary numbers show a 12.6 percent rate in 2007 – still considerably higher than the rate in 1990). Last week, our center released an issue brief on this topic because we think it is such an important issue.