Oklahoma health-care professionals reported to the state a record 517 cases of newborn infants who tested positive for dangerous drugs or alcohol last year, up from 320 when officials began compiling statistics in 2013.
State officials said they couldn’t determine how much of the 62 percent increase was attributable to rising drug use among pregnant women and how much to improved reporting and testing by health care personnel.
Much of the reported increase involved prenatal exposure to marijuana. Health professionals told Oklahoma Watch that not enough research has been done to determine the long-term effects of prenatal pot exposure on infants and children.
Yet the statistics, which cover fiscal years ending June 30, make it clear that significant numbers of babies are born with addictive opioids or illegal methamphetamine in their bloodstreams. Both can cause extreme distress, and sometimes withdrawal, and in some cases contribute to the stillbirth of a baby.
It can be a heartbreaking sight, health professionals said: A days-old baby, often undersized, crying and trembling, wincing from mere exposure to light in a neonatal intensive care unit.
For Dub Turner, head of the drug-endangered children’s section at the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs Control, observing one such child was a “gut-wrenching” experience.
“It would shake and scream and cry. There was nothing they could do … It was trembling, kind of like a seizure,” said Turner, who visited a southern Oklahoma hospital to see for himself what happens after a meth-addicted mom gives birth.
Turner said he stood outside the window of the hospital’s NIC unit observing the 5-day-old boy until he could take no more. “I wasn’t going in there,” he said, his eyes tearing up at the recollection. “I lasted about 30 minutes.”
A blood test confirmed large amounts of meth in the baby’s system. “As soon as they confronted the mother, she left the hospital,” Turner said. “She left the baby.”
The increase in prenatal exposure reports appear to coincide with other indicators, including the increasing availability of high-potency marijuana, a flood of imported meth and high rates of opioid painkiller use.
Several health professionals told Oklahoma Watch they believe the official counts are understated because they are based solely on reports phoned in to the Department of Human Services from doctors, social workers and other medical personnel.
An undetermined number of exposure cases probably go undetected or unreported, health officials said. Lab tests generally are performed only when mothers are believed to be users or their babies show signs of exposure after delivery.
Oklahoma Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization that produces in-depth and investigative journalism on a range of public-policy issues facing the state. For more Oklahoma Watch content, go to www.oklahomawatch.org.
