Black and Immigrant: Exploring the Effects of Ethnicity and Foreign-Born Status on Infant Health

The birth experiences and prenatal behaviors of Black immigrant mothers have received relatively little attention. Literature has focused in recent years on birth outcomes among immigrant mothers compared to native-born mothers, and within-group differences in infant health among Blacks. While there are suggestive findings that infants born to Black immigrant mothers are still at a relative health disadvantage to non-Black immigrant and U.S.-born mothers, this evidence is based on studies that are limited for various reasons, whether in geographic scope and/or generalizability or because they examine a limited set of infant health outcomes.

This report compares prenatal behaviors and birth outcomes of Black immigrant mothers to those of other immigrant and U.S.-born mothers, using federal vital statistics. It finds that Black immigrant mothers are less likely to give birth to preterm or low-birth-weight infants than U.S.-born Black women, yet are more likely to experience these adverse birth outcomes than other groups of immigrant and U.S.-born women.