INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - Indiana is getting a $2.1 million federal grant to explore ways of reducing the state’s high rate of pregnancy-related deaths.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will provide the State Department of Health with more than $420,000 a year for five years to improve Indiana’s ability to collect data about pregnancy-related deaths and devise ways to combat them.

The Indianapolis Business Journal reports Indiana has the nation’s third-highest rate of deaths of women while pregnant or within one year of their pregnancy’s end.

The national maternal-mortality rate is 20.7 deaths per 100,000 births, but Indiana’s rate is 41.4 deaths per 100,000 births, according to the United Health Foundation.

Only two other states scored worse. Georgia has 46.2 deaths per 100,000 births, and Louisiana has 44.8 deaths per 100,000 births.

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Information from: Indianapolis Business Journal, http://www.ibj.com

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