Reasons why this is a poor measure when evaluating the US health care system:

On it’s face, the statistics appear damning: according to a Save The Children report funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the US has the penultimate newborn mortality rate in the developed world–only Latvia ranks lower. Our current infant mortality rate of 6.4 per 1,000 live births is high compared with the 3.2 to 3.6 per 1,000 estimated for the three top-scoring countries in the world-Iceland, Finland, and Japan. One has to focus a critical eye on the statistics to understand what they really say about American health care for newborns: the US provides some of the best care for neonates in the world.