Has Maternal Mortality Really Doubled in the U.S.?
Statistics have suggested a sharp increase in the number of American women dying as a complication of pregnancy since the late 1980s, but a closer look at the data hints that all is not as it seems
By Dina Fine Maron | June 8, 2015


Answers about the increases in U.S. maternal mortality are hard to pin down.
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There is no charity walk to raise awareness about the 700 to 800 women that die each year during pregnancy or shortly after giving birth in the U.S. There are no dedicated colored-plastic wristbands. But statistics in recent years have revealed a worrisome trend: the rate of maternal mortality in the U.S. has more than doubled in the past few decades. Whereas 7.2 women died per 100,000 births in 1987, that number swelled to 17.8 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2009 and 2011. The uptick occurred even as maternal mortality dropped in less-developed settings around the world. Now women giving birth in the U.S. are at a higher risk of dying than those giving birth in China or Saudi Arabia. The reason for this disturbing trend has eluded researchers, however.

So what exactly is it about being in a family way that is getting worse in America? According to some experts at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ...

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Supercharged Large Hadron Collider Tackles Universe's Big Questions
Check out this graphical guide to the science ahead at the LHC in Europe
By Elizabeth Gibney and Nature magazine | June 4, 2015


Credit: CERN

Ramped up in power after a two-year upgrade, the world’s most powerful particle accelerator is once again doing science. Following its official restart on June 3, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, Europe’s particle-physics lab near Geneva, Switzerland, can smash protons together faster and with higher energies than during its first run, which ended in February 2013. Our graphical guide illuminates the discoveries that could lie ahead in the next run of the LHC.



The first run began in earnest in November 2009. The LHC collided particles—mainly protons, but also heavier particles such as lead ions—at high enough energies to confirm the existence of ...

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