Suburbs see rise in low birth weights.(Brief Article)

2002 SEP 5 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- More and more low-birth-weight babies are being born across the country, and the rate is growing even faster in the suburbs than in the cities.

Typically, people living in the nation's central cities are more likely to experience problems with their health than their suburban counterparts, but those differences are narrowing in some cases, according to a report that compares the 100 largest cities with their suburbs.

The report, released August 6, 2002, by researchers at the State University of New York Downstate Medical Center, looked at the change in health measures in both cities and their suburbs between 1990 and 1999 or 2000, depending on availability of data.

For all but low-birth-weight babies, the statistics improved over the decade, nationally, in cities and in suburbs. The rates of tuberculosis, AIDS, syphilis, gonorrhea and homicide all fell, though some were starting to rise again in the late 1990s.

In the case of low-birth-weight babies, the problem is still more acute in the central cities than in suburban areas, the report found.

In 1999, 8.9% of city babies were born dangerously small - 5.5 pounds or lighter, making them more likely to be sickly and more likely to die than larger babies. In 1999, 7.0% of suburban babies were born that small.

But the differences have narrowed since 1990, when 8.5% of city babies and 6.1% of suburban babies were born little. The rate of low-birth-weight babies grew by 14% in the suburbs, versus just 5% in the cities.