Babies are better off in Iran

I wanted to alert everybody to something you need to watch or DVR tonight. ABC's 20/20 is showing the documentary Babyland at 9 central tonight (Friday). It is about the astonishing high rate of infant mortality in Memphis and especially in some of the poorer zip codes in the city. This hits close to home for me since when we lived there I got involved in some of these areas. The Commercial Appeal published an excellent article on the problem a few years ago.


Below are cemetery workers burying 8 homemade pine coffins of small little lives that were cut tragically short.

Some facts of the situation:

Memphis has the highest infant death rate of the largest 60 cities in the US

North Memphis' 38108 zip code has higher infant death rates than Iran, Vietnam and El Salvador.

A infant dies every 43 hours in Memphis.

The problem is a very complicated one consisting of poverty, unequal health care access, teenage pregnancies and many other factors. I encourage you to watch and reflect on how lucky most of us are to grow up in safety and security.