Infant Homicide
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Headline

The infant homicide rate increased from 4.3 per 100,000 in 1970 to 9.2 per 100,000 in 2000, before falling to 8.0 per 100,000 in 2004. (See Figure 1)

Importance

Homicide accounts for more than one in five injury-related deaths among infants (under one year of age) in the United States.¹ Infants are most likely to be killed by their mother during the first week of life but are more likely to be killed by a male (usually their father or stepfather) thereafter.² Half of all infant homicides occur by the fourth month of life, and the risk of infant homicide is highest on the day of birth. Homicide risk is greater in the first year of life than in any other year of childhood before age 17.³

Research studies of infant death data drawn from multiple agency records (such as police or social service records) indicate that the actual rate of infant deaths attributable to substantial abuse or neglect of infants and children up to four years old is more than twice as high as the official rates reported in death certificate data.⁴ Better reporting of the circumstances surrounding infant fatalities would improve the quality of death certificate records. Studies have also indicated that a substantial but uncertain number of unreported infant homicide deaths may occur among very young infants, particularly those infants for whom no birth or death certificates are found, such as those who are born with no trained attendants and not in a clinical setting.⁵

Key risk factors associated with infant homicides focus on the circumstances surrounding the birth of the child. Among the homicides on the first day of life, 95 percent of the victims were not born in a hospital.⁶ Other important maternal risk factors include a second or subsequent infant born to an unmarried teenage mother (19 years of age or younger); no prenatal visit before the sixth month of pregnancy or no prenatal care; a history of maternal mental illness; a mother with 12 or fewer years of education; and premature birth (gestation of less than 28 weeks).⁷ There is a notable absence of data on risk factors associated with males, either biological fathers or others, reflecting in part the frequency of father data missing on birth certificates.

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Trends

Between 1970 and 2000, the official infant homicide rate rose dramatically - from 4.3 to 9.2 infant deaths per 100,000 children under age one. Between 2000 and 2002, the rate declined to 7.5 per 100,000, and in 2004 was 8.0 per 100,000. (See Figure 1)

Differences by Gender

In most years, males have been more likely than females to be killed during the first year of life, though in 2004 the infant homicide rate was 8.0 per 100,000 children under age one for boys, and 7.9 for girls. (See Table 1)

Differences by Race and Hispanic Origin

Non-Hispanic black infants are substantially more at-risk than other infants of dying from homicide during their first year of life. In 2002, the most recent year for which race-specific data are available, non-Hispanic blacks had an infant homicide rate of 18.0 per 100,000, while non-Hispanic whites had a rate of 5.1 per 100,000. Hispanics had an infant homicide rate of 6.0 per 100,000 in 2002. (See Figure 2)

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Related Indicators

Infant, Child, and Teen Mortality, Child Maltreatment, Teen Homicide, Suicide, and Firearm Death

State and Local Estimates

Injury mortality data by age for 1981-2004 by census region and state can be found using WISQARS at http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/wisqars/.

State and county mortality data by age for 1979-2000 can be found using CDC WONDER at http://wonder.cdc.gov/mortsql.html.

Both WISQARS and WONDER are maintained by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

International Estimates

None

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National Goals

The Healthy People 2010 initiative has set a goal to reduce maltreatment fatalities in children under age 18 (from 1.6 per 100,000 in 1998 to 1.4 per 100,000 by 2010).

For additional information visit: http://www.health.gov/healthypeople/document/html/objectives/15-33.htm (Goal 15-33)

What Works: Programs and Interventions that May Influence this Indicator

None available at this time.

Research References

¹A. Minino, R. Anderson, L. Fingerhut, M. Boudreault, and M. Warner. (2006). "Deaths: Injuries, 2002," National Vital Statistics Reports 54(10). Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr54/nvsr54_10.pdf

²Overpeck, MD, RA Brenner, AC Trumble, LB Trifilette, and HW Berendes. 1998. Risk factors for infant homicide in the United States. New England Journal of Medicine. 339(17):1211-1216.

³WISQARS. 2002, United States Homicide Injury Deaths and Rates per 100,000. Available at:
http://webappa.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/mortrate10_sy.html.

⁴Crume, TL, C DiGuiseppi, T Byers, AP Sirotnak, and CG Garrett. 2002. Underascertainment of child maltreatment fatalities by death certificates, 1990-1998. Pediatrics. 110(2).http://www.pediatrics.org/cgi/reprint/110/2/e18.pdf

⁵Overpeck, MD, RA Brenner, C Cosgrove, AC Trumble, K Kochanek, and M MacDorman. 2002. National underascertainment of sudden unexpected infant deaths associated with deaths of unknown cause. Pediatrics 109(2):274-283.

⁶Paulozzi, L., & Sells, M. (2002). Variation in homicide risk during infancy - United States, 1989-1998. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 51 (09): 187-189. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5109a3.htm

⁷Ibid; and Overpeck, MD, RA Brenner, AC Trumble, LB Trifilette, and HW Berendes. 1998.

⁸Knight, B. Forensic problems in practice. Practitioner 1976: 217:444-448.

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Definition

Infant homicides are classified as deaths purposefully inflicted by other persons on children less than one year old. Data on infant homicide are developed by the National Center for Health Statistics, drawn from death certificates recorded by local medical examiners or coroners and reported to the National Vital Statistics System. These records code infant deaths by use of the injury classification framework developed by the International Classification of Diseases (ICD) codes, 9th and 10th editions. For more information about ICD codes please see:
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/dvs/icd10fct.pdf

A small number of stillbirths may be incorrectly classified as infant homicides. However, medical examiners usually will attribute a death to infanticide only when they can rule out other causes (i.e., autopsy evidence indicates that respiration had occurred, no evidence indicates death from natural causes, and circumstantial evidence is consistent with homicide).⁸

Data Source

Data for 2004: National Center for Health Statistics. Health United States 2006 with Chartbook on Trends in the Health of Americans. Hyattsville, Maryland: 2006: Table 45. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus06.pdf

Data for 2003: Hoyert, Donna L., Kung, Hsiang-Ching, & Smith, Betty L. "Deaths: Preliminary Data for 2003," National Vital Statistics Reports, 53(15): Table 5. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr53/nvsr53_15.pdf

Data for 2002: Kenneth D. Kochanek, Sherry L. Murphy, Robert N. Anderson, and Chester Scott. "Deaths: Final Data for 2002" National Vital Statistics Reports, 53(5). Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics: Table 31.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr53/nvsr53_05acc.pdf

Data for 2001 totals: Arias, Elizabeth, Robert Anderson, Hsiang-Ching Kung, Sherry Murphy and Kenneth Kochanek, (2003). Deaths: Final Data for 2001. National Vital Statistics Reports: 52(3). Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. Table 9.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr52/nvsr52_03.pdf

Data for 1990-2001, race-ethnicity and 2000-2001 gender: derived by Child Trends from WISQARS (Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System) - an "interactive database system that provides customized reports of injury-related data."
http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/wisqars/

Data for 2000 totals: Minino AM, Arias E, Kochanek KD, Murphy SL, Smith BL. (2002). Deaths: Final Data for 2000. National Vital Statistics Reports: 50(15). Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. Table 9.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr50/nvsr50_15.pdf

Data for totals and by gender for 1970-1995, 1999, revised 2000: National Center for Health Statistics. Health United States 2003 with Chartbook on Trends in the Health of Americans. Hyattsville, Maryland: 2003: Table 45.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/hus.htm

Raw Data Source

National Vital Statistics System http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss.htm

Approximate Date of Next Update

November 2007

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