My friend said 1in4 babies die soon after birth?????

[BlueBunny23]

I made an online mum friend some months ago we were both pregnant at the same time, her last baby died soon after birth and she’s been struggling with her pregnancy, my baby was born 2 weeks ago and her baby is due any day now and we were chatting and she said how scared she is because of the last time and that what if it happens again and I said isn’t it very very rare and she said no 1in4 babies die soon after birth or in the days/weeks after birth. Is this true??? I’m on constant edge now so scared for my 2 week old baby!!

She’s wrong

No that’s absolutely not true

Definitely not true

Bollocks

1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage, most of them before the mum realises she's pregnant. Maybe that's the statistics she's thinking about.

Could she have got that figure from global stats?

Have you ever met this online friend? She doesn't sound real. Some people like pretending to be pregnant then losing the baby, for the sympathy. I can't see how anyone would think that statistic is true

No. 1 in 4 pregnancies end in the first trimester.

has she got the wrong end of the stick somewhere (ie the miscarriage stat above) but is clinging to it as it makes her loss seem more “normal” as in it happens to lots of people and is unavoidable, rather than why has this rare event happened to me, I must have done something to cause it?

or does she have some genetic issue which means 1:4 of her babies won’t survive?

either way, she’s wrong for the general UK population.

She's wrong. According to ONS In 2021, the stillbirth rate rose to 4.2 stillbirths per 1,000 births from 3.9 stillbirths per 1,000 births in 2020, a 7.7% increase. The stillbirth rate is now similar to the rate observed in 2018

This was my thought too….

There is no way that statistic is true.

She’s completely wrong.

It is very rare for babies to die soon after birth.

I did a quick search on google for infant mortality, and according to the office for National statistics, the infant mortality rate for England and Wales in 2020 was 3.6 deaths per 1000 live births.
That’s less than 4 babies dying in their first year out of every thousand babies born. The vast majority of babies born survive.

100% wrong though I feel sorry for her.

Shes probably feeling “reassured” by that in a way. But take comfort yourself that it’s not correct

OP, this ´fact’ is obviously wrong. Totally obviously wrong. If 1 in 4 babies died soon after birth a huge number of your friends at school would have lost a baby brother or sister. There would be cases in your wider family. Basically everyone would know that babies often die and it would be very visible in society.

Why would you instantly believe something an online stranger said without doing minimal research? It's really not hard to look up official statistics