Moms need more than flowers in May — they need support year-round

Today a lot of mothers are getting brunch, bouquets, cards, chocolate and a whole lot of attention. They'll be thrilled, though there may be a few other things on their wish list for the rest of the year.

Last year, the Institute for American Values, a marriage-advocacy group, surveyed mothers around the country. It found that while most of them felt great about being moms, they still thought more appreciation would be nice. In this survey, mothers' concerns weren't just about their happiness, but about the well-being of children, which shouldn't surprise anyone who's spent time around good mothers.

Most of the mothers surveyed said, "society is not doing a good job of meeting the needs of mothers, children, or families."

About 4 million children are born each year in the United States. Their destiny is the country's destiny, but we don't always act as if we know that.

Look at infant mortality. Last Monday, Save the Children issued its latest report. The United States has an infant mortality rate of 5 per 1,000, near the bottom of a list of 33 industrialized nations. Among developed nations only Latvia has a worse rate.

The report listed several contributors to the high death rate: lack of national health insurance, short maternity leaves, teen pregnancies (about 415,000 teenagers give birth each year) and obesity. These are things we can do something about.

Black women are especially affected by many of those factors. The death rate for black infants is 9 per 1,000 births, in the range of developing nations.

Around the world, 4 million children die each year, the same number born each year in the U.S., and most of those deaths could be prevented by a few easy actions.

Children who survive face hardships that no mother would wish on her own child, from malnutrition to being sold into sex slavery.

Save the Children ranks Sweden as the best country for mothers and Niger as the worst. Niger also has the world's highest fertility rate — the average woman there can expect to have 7.5 children.

Save the Children measured countries on several standards, including adult female literacy, infant mortality, the percentage of women in the national government, school enrollment, contraception use, and a number of health-related indicators.

We are ranked 10th, which wouldn't be bad except that we're the world's superpower. In the Institute for American Values' survey, mothers here said their biggest concerns are for their children's education and safety. They are worried about health care and finances.

Most said they want more time to spend with their families and they wish American culture made it easier to instill positive values in their children. They don't want to wrestle with advertisers and fight media influence.

A few years ago, the project issued a call to create a motherhood movement to address the needs of mothers, children and families.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are 80.5 million mothers in the United States. That would be a lot of voices to harness, assuming they could find the time for political action.

We've been celebrating Mother's Day since 1914, but we've had a mixed record on turning that recognition into concrete support for mothers, children and families.

Keep the flowers coming, but mothers also deserve gifts that last longer than chocolate, and that aren't fattening.

Jerry Large: 206-464-3346 or jlarge@seattletimes.com.

His column runs Thursdays and Sundays and is found at www.seattletimes.com/columnists.