Please read Dr. Muchomba’s article in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine titled, “Racialized Police Use of Force and Maternal Health.“
Black women in the U.S. are 3 times more likely than White women to die from pregnancy-related causes, twice as likely to experience severe maternal morbidity (SMM), and up to 3 times more likely to have perinatal depression or anxiety. Poor maternal health can adversely impact maternal quality of life and the health and development of offspring and confer social and economic costs to families and communities. Education, income, and health insurance are known risk factors for poor maternal health but account for little of the observed racial disparities.
Racism is increasingly being recognized as a fundamental cause of poor health, but potential links between racism and maternal health and disparities have been understudied. The few existing studies have primarily investigated experiences of interpersonal racial discrimination, not community-level racism, and found that such exposures were associated with adverse maternal health outcomes and behaviors. Institutional racism, or disenfranchisement by race that has been codified in institutional policies and discriminatory practices, may also compromise health and produce health disparities by affecting the distributions of psychosocial stressors, health-promoting resources, and environmental health risks. To read the full article.
Racialized Police Use of Force and Maternal Health. Muchomba FM, Teitler JO, Fox C, Reichman NE. Am J Prev Med. 2025 Mar;68(3):535-544. PMID: 39617107 DOI: 1016/j.amepre.2024.11.017