COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – During his Thursday update on COVID-19, Gov. Mike DeWine announced he’s establishing the Eliminating Racial Disparities in Infant Mortality Task Force. He pointed out that statistics show a Black baby in Ohio is almost three times as likely to die before their first birthday than a white baby.

“It’s a racial disparity and it’s extremely, extremely troubling,” he said.

The Ohio Department of Health’s 2019 Infant Mortality report was released on Thursday. According to the report the infant mortality rate for white babies was 5.1 per 1,000 live births in 2019. The Black infant mortality rate that same year was almost three times higher at 14.3. The rate was down from 2015, 2016, and 2017 but was up from 2018.

“It’s just simply unacceptable and we can correct it. We can change it,” said Gov. DeWine.

The governor says the goal of the task force is to develop a statewide shared vision and strategy for reducing infant mortality rates and eliminating racial disparities as soon as possible. It will create actionable recommendation for interventions, performance and quality improvement, data collection, and policies to advise the effort to improve Ohio’s investment strategies in addressing racial inequities, according to the governor.

Overall the number of babies who have died before turning one has gone down for three straight years but Gov. DeWine says the racial disparities are unacceptable. He says his administration has done work from the beginning on the issue of infant mortality but added it’s too early to tell the impact of those program’s because the report released Thursday only goes through 2019.

“We do believe these programs will make a difference but frankly we know we need to do even more beyond these programs,” he said.

CelebrateOne just recognized its five year anniversary. The coalition works to eliminate infant mortality in central Ohio. During the five year celebration, the topic of racial disparities was brought up as one of the big issues to work on moving forward.

“As we plan for the future we ca not let up on closing the disparity gap between white non Hispanic babies and black non Hispanic babies,” said Maureen Stapleton, Executive Director of CelebrateOne.