Mountain State Spotlight – West Virginia’s babies and new mothers are at concerningly high risk of dying during and around childbirth. One of the key state strategies for addressing these problems are the infant and maternal mortality review teams, government-mandated panels to identify why people are dying, which groups are most at risk and what can be done to prevent deaths in the future.
Read the full article.
Under current law, the panel isn’t allowed to talk to family members of the deceased. But lawmakers are considering changing that: HB 4874, which is on second reading in the House tomorrow, would, among other things, allow the panels to talk with family members if the majority of the panel votes there is “a clear public health interest” to do so.
But experts and some lawmakers say the changes don’t go far enough: they want to remove the line mentioning families altogether, leaving it up to the panel whether they would do so or not.
