Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from North Carolina Surveillance of Birth Defects
Careful monitoring of birth defects is of special importance given that North Carolina had the tenth highest 1985 rate of infant mortality in the United States (1) and that for 1984 - 86 congenital anomalies were the most frequent underlying cause of death for infants up to one year of age (figure They were also the second most frequent for children one to four years of age (figure Congenital anomalies were the state's seventh leading cause of years of potential life lost (table accounting for percent of all such years. Public concern regarding the effects of drugs and environmental toxins and teratogens suggests the need for keen surveillance of the relationship between such products and congenital anomalies. Comparing state rates of anomaly to national benchmarks might clarify links between anomalies and various drugs, chemicals, and environmental contaminants, thus reducing the possibility of another thalidomide-like tragedy. Detection of such links might also provide early warning signals for diseases such as cancer, where the latency period is usually longer than that of a birth defect. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.