The abortion industry’s media friend, CNN, reported a study by JAMA Pediatrics implying that if Texas’ pro-life laws didn’t exist and more abortion was allowed, then the infant mortality rate wouldn’t be increasing.  

The JAMA study piggybacked off CNN’s July 2023 investigative reporting, writing:  

“Earlier research – spurred by a CNN investigative report – found that infant mortality spiked in Texas after a 6-week abortion ban took effect in 2021, and experts say the new data suggests that the impacts of…restrictions enacted by some states post-Dobbs have been large enough to affect broader trends.” 

In October 2024, JAMA Pediatrics released a study investigating the infant mortality rate trends for the 18 months after Roe v. Wade was reversed.  

“In the months that infant mortality was higher than expected – October 2022, March 2023 and April 2023 – rates were about 7% higher than typical, leading to an average of 247 more infant deaths in each of those months,” CNN reported. “About 80% of those additional infant deaths could be attributed to congenital anomalies, which were higher than expected in six of the 18 months following the Dobbs decision, according to the new research.”  

The CNN article as a whole exists to prove a barbarous point: that if the abortion industry could kill children in the womb, they wouldn’t have to die outside of the womb. If that’s not bad enough, abortion pundits are pointing the finger at pro-life laws, as if they’re to blame for allowing children to have a chance to live instead of starved or dismembered in the womb.

However, Dr. Michael New, senior associate scholar at the Charlotte Lozier Institute (CLI), rebutted the biased reporting in a recent National Review column.  

“Not surprisingly, there is much less here than meets the eye,” writes New. “The authors report a 7 percent increase in the infant mortality rate after Dobbs. However, other data released by the CDC tell a different story. There is some evidence of a slight increase in infant mortality in 2022. However, CDC data indicate that between the first quarter of 2023 and the first quarter of 2024, the U.S. infant mortality rate actually decreased by 2.4 percent. In short, there has not been a consistent upward trend in infant mortality post-Dobbs.” (emphasis added)  

Going even further, New points out that JAMA looks at national infant death data, supposed to be data on a state level, making JAMA’s conclusions even more questionable.  

So, New’s full acknowledgment of the data points out that CNN purposefully or ignorantly ignored the totality of the data to fit the narrative that pro-life laws are evil and result in more dead infants. Meanwhile, pro-abortion laws almost always guarantee the death of an innocent and defenseless child in the womb. New points out this very fact:  

“Many children in these circumstances were tragically dying before Dobbs. However, since they were aborted, they were not counted as infant deaths.”

The irony of CNN and JAMA blaming pro-life laws for the rise in infant deaths would be laughable if it weren’t so tragic. Lesson learned: before blaming the pro-life laws, look at the source, research, and investigate. 

READ NEXT: With More Pro-Life State Laws, Which States Are Stockpiling Chemical Abortion Pills?