Latest News
December 10, 2021
Fears and restrictions tied to the COVID-19 pandemic appear to have led to a sharp increase in women opting to give birth at home rather than in a hospital or other facility in 2020, new research suggests.
The number of home births rose by nearly 20% from more than 38,000 in 2019 to more than 45,000 in 2020, according to the findings of an analysis released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics.
Elizabeth Gregory, a CDC health scientist and lead author of the study, says home births as a percentage of all births in 2020 rose by 22% to their highest level since 1990, accounting for 1.26% of all births last year compared with 1.03% in 2019.
Since 1990, home births have accounted for approximately 1% of all U.S. births annually, according to the report. But the researchers noted that interest in giving birth at home increased amid concerns about contracting COVID-19, hospital visitation restrictions, and infants being separated from mothers suspected of having COVID-19.
“The percentage of home births rose for each month March through December in 2020 compared with the same period in 2019,” Gregory says. “The timing of the increases in home births generally corresponds with the initial surge of COVID-19 cases in the United States.”
The percentage of home births increased across white, Black and Hispanic women in 2020, with that share rising by 21% from 2019 to 2020 among white women compared with increasing by only 1% from 2018 to 2019. The percentage of home births among Black women rose by 36% in 2020 after staying relatively stable from 2018 to 2019, while the percentage among Hispanic women increased by 30% following a 6% rise from 2018 to 2019.
The percentage of home births significantly increased in 40 states from 2019 to 2020 compared with similar increases in only six states from 2018 to 2029. South Dakota saw the largest percentage increase in home births from 2019 to 2020 at 68%, while Wisconsin had the smallest significant increase at 11%. Increases reported in nine states and the District of Columbia were not found to be significant, according to the report.
The report offers additional insight into how COVID-19 has changed how many Americans have accessed health care services for conditions not related to the disease.
A drop in hospital admissions from March 8 to Dec. 5 last year accounted for approximately 8% of predicted volume levels for the entire year, according to an analysis released in February by the Kaiser Family Foundation. In late 2020, non-COVID-19 hospital admissions fell to around 80% of predicted levels, the KFF report found.
Yet while the pandemic curbed in-person medical visits, the use of remote alternatives saw a precipitous increase. The share of Medicare visits conducted through telehealth, for example, saw a 63-fold increase from 840,000 in 2019 to 52.7 million in 2020, according to a recent report from the Department of Health and Human Services.
