Home Births Hit 40-Year High

Home births are cool again. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a new study Tuesday showing that home births are at the highest level in four decades, though they only comprised 1.36 percent of U.S. births in 2012. That year, more than 35,000 babies were born at home. The trend of eschewing hospitals began in 2004, the CDC says. A much higher proportion of white mothers seek the home-birth option, and the state with the most out-of-hospital births is Alaska.