Disparities in birth weight and gestational age by ethnic ancestry in South American countries.

JORGE LOPEZ CAMELO, WEHBY GL, GILI JA, PAWLUK M, CASTILLA EE, JORGE LÓPEZ-CAMELO JS.

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH

BIRKHAUSER VERLAG AG

Lugar: BASEL; Año: 2015 vol. 60 p. 343 - 351

1661-8556

AbstractOBJECTIVES: We examine disparities inbirth weight and gestational age by ethnic ancestry in 2000-2011 in eight SouthAmerican countries.METHODS: The sample included 60,480singleton live births. Regression models were estimated to evaluate differencesin birth outcomes by ethnic ancestry controlling for time trends.RESULTS: Significant disparitieswere found in seven countries. In four countries-Brazil, Ecuador, Uruguay, andVenezuela-we found significant disparities in both low birth weight and pretermbirth. Disparities in preterm birth alone were observed in Argentina, Bolivia,and Colombia. Several differences in continuous birth weight, gestational age,and fetal growth rate were also observed. There were no systematic patterns ofdisparities between the evaluated ethnic ancestry groups across the studycountries, in that no racial/ethnic group consistently had the best or worstoutcomes in all countries.CONCLUSIONS: Racial/ethnic disparitiesin infant health are common in several South American countries. Differencesacross countries suggest that racial/ethnic disparities are driven by socialand economic mechanisms. Researchers and policymakers should acknowledge thesedisparities and develop research and policy programs to effectively targetthem.