PORTLAND, Maine — New research indicates that paid family leave can lead to healthier babies.
A researcher at the University of Southern Maine was part of a team that studied data from New York, which showed a reduction in respiratory tract infections in babies once the state started offering paid family leave in 2018.
Researchers looked at data from about 53,000 hospital and emergency department visits for babies from 2015 to before the pandemic started in 2020.
Researchers found babies experienced an 18 percent lower acute encounter rate in New York once the state began offering eight weeks of paid family leave in comparison to the rate in nearby states that did not offer paid family leave at the time: Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont.
"That was a bigger effect than I would have expected," USM researcher Katherine Ahrens said.
Ahrens said paid family leave allowed parents, particularly mothers, to stay home with their newborns, which led to fewer cases of respiratory infections like RSV in babies 8 weeks old and younger.
"It’s good to study the effects, not just the effects on the economic, financial, and labor effects, but also the health effects of these policies, because I do think they help women and families," Ahrens said.
Ahrens said she anticipates Maine will see similar results after the state offers 12 weeks of paid family leave in 2026.
"I would anticipate that in Maine we won’t see if something getting worse, and if anything, we would see things getting better, particularly for this outcome [infant health benefits]," she said,
The policy change did not seem to impact 1-year-olds' health, according to Ahrens.