Maternal stress can occur before, during, and between pregnancies which can negatively impact both mothers and babies.  Experiences of racism can increase these risks. 

In Guilford County, Black babies die at almost three times the rate of white infants.  For far too long we’ve incorrectly placed individual blame for lack of education and/or economics, generational or situational poverty on these disparities rather than looking at how racism has played a role.  Black birthing people are often treated differently than White birthing people in our health care systems. 

High levels of stress can cause health problems like high blood pressure and heart disease.   Stress can increase the chance of having a premature birth or a low birthweight baby.  Babies born too soon or too small are at increased risk for health problems.  Stress can occur in many forms:

• Negative life events
• Catastrophic events
• Long-lasting stress
• Depression or anxiety
• Neighborhood stress
• Racism
• Pregnancy-related stress 

Source: March of Dimes

Every Baby Guilford produced this video to illustrate the impact of institutionalized racism on Black maternal health.

The Influence of Key Historical Events on Black/White Disparities in Infant Mortality

Every Baby Guilford is working to end discrimination and implicit bias in maternal healthcare settings in our community   We started with our healthcare institutions to provide race equity training through the Racial Equity Institute's Groundwater and Phase I trainings and March of Dimes Implicit Bias training for healthcare workers.  This learning journey of racial equity prepared us for Phase II of our collective work, to create strategy teams that will dig deep in policies, practices, and procedures that perpetuate discrimination and implicit bias to make system level change to positively impact maternal health services.  We've partnered with RIOTT for Change for Phase II of our work.