In numbers, US infant deaths surpassed 20,500 in 2022 – 610 more than the year before nationwide. But Georgia had 116 more infant deaths than the year before, and Texas had 251 more.

“It would appear that some of the states could be having a larger impact on the [national] rate,” Ely said, adding that smaller increases elsewhere also have an effect – and that it’s hard to parse out exactly what places, policies or other factors are behind the national statistic.

While I applaud scientists for not jumping to conclusions (that’s how you get pseudoscience), I bet they have some good hypotheses…