A troubling shift in prenatal care appears most pronounced among minority communities, with Black mothers showing a drop in first-trimester care from about 69.7% in 2021 to 65.1% in 2024.

Experts warn that delaying prenatal care risks missing critical screenings, guidance, and ultrasounds essential for maternal and fetal health.

There has been an uptick in later or no prenatal care, with second-trimester starts rising from 15.4% to 17.3% and third-trimester or no care increasing from 6.3% to 7.3%.

Early provisional data from 2025 hint at some access improvements, though final figures could alter the picture.

The report does not identify specific reasons for the shift to later care, but signals a troubling change after improvements seen from 2016 to 2021.

Context notes emphasize that earlier visits enable earlier problem detection and guidance, highlighting this shift as a reversal of a prior positive trend.

Michelle Osterman is cited as the report’s lead author, with input from Dr. Grace Ferguson and Dr. Clayton Alfonso on implications and potential causes, alongside broader notes on maternity care deserts.

The CDC-based report is referenced, and quotes from Dr. Clayton Alfonso, Dr. Grace Ferguson, and lead author Michelle Osterman frame the findings.

Discussions include distrust, documentation hurdles for undocumented patients, and the wider issue of maternity care deserts limiting access to care.

This shift marks a departure from a decade-long trend of increasing prenatal care between 2016 and 2021.

Contributing factors may include growing maternity care deserts and barriers such as travel distance and Medicaid-related access, with possible impacts from post-Roe abortion restrictions on obstetric practice in some states.

A March of Dimes 2024 report found that over a third of U.S. counties are maternity care deserts, aligning with reduced access to prenatal care.