title: International Ranking of Infant Mortality Rates: Taiwan Compared with European Countries.
abstract: Rankings of infant mortality rates are commonly cited international comparisons to assess the health status of individual countries. We compared the infant mortality rate of Taiwan with those of European countries for 2004 according to two definitions.
  
  
  
  First, the countries were ranked on the basis of crude infant, neonatal, and postneonatal mortality rates. The countries were then ranked according to the mortality rates calculated after exclusion of live births with a known birth weight of <1000 g, which is the definition set by the World Health Organization.
  
  
  
  Taiwan was ranked 11(th), 12(th), and 15(th) among 26 high-income countries for crude infant, neonatal, and postneonatal mortality rates, respectively. The ranks were 12(th), 16(th), and 15(th), respectively, for mortality rates, excluding live births with a birth weight of <1000 g. However, in only seven, four, and 10 countries were the mortality rate ratios statistically significantly lower than Taiwan in infant, neonatal, and postneonatal mortality, respectively, according to the second definition.
  
  
  
  The ranking of Taiwan was similar (11(th) vs. 12(th)) according the two definitions. However, after consideration of the confidence interval, only six countries (Sweden, Finland, Czech Republic, Belgium, Austria, and Germany) had infant mortality rates statistically significantly lower than those of Taiwan in 2004.
authors.affiliation: National Cheng Kung University Research Center for Health Data and Department of Public Health, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Fu-Wen
authors.initials: FW
authors.lastname: Liang
authors.affiliation: National Cheng Kung University Research Center for Health Data and Department of Public Health, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Tsung-Hsueh
authors.initials: TH
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Mei-Hwan
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: Child Health Alliance Taiwan, Taipei, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Hung-Chi
authors.initials: HC
authors.lastname: Lue
authors.affiliation: Institute of Health Policy and Management, School of Public Health, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Tung-Liang
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Chiang
authors.affiliation: Department of Public Health, School of Medicine, College of Medicine, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan. Electronic address: ylhuang@tmu.edu.tw.
authors.forename: Ya-Li
authors.initials: YL
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: Department of Statistics, Ministry of Health and Welfare, Taipei, Taiwan.
authors.forename: Lea-Hua
authors.initials: LH
authors.lastname: Chen
mesh_terms: D001724:Birth Weight; D005060:Europe / Q000453:epidemiology; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007226:Infant Mortality; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D013624:Taiwan / Q000453:epidemiology
keywords: Taiwan; infant mortality; international comparisons; neonatal mortality; postneonatal mortality