Statisticians in the States are to reassess their estimate of Bermuda's infant mortality rate after it was discovered that their assumptions may be based on outdated information.

A row broke out on the Island earlier this month about the number of babies who die here in their first year after a natural childbirth organisation cited information from the US Central Intelligence Agency's World Factbook which Health Minister Nelson Bascome insisted was inflated.

Promotional literature for the Motherbaby International Film Festival 2008 — held at BUEI from September 12 to 14 — quoted the CIA World Factbook's 2008 estimate that Bermuda has 7.87 deaths per thousand live births and its ranking of the Island as 60th in a world league table of the safest countries for birth.

Mr. Bascome held a press conference to say the true rate was 3.6 deaths per thousand live births — a rate festival organiser Sophie Cannonier said was still too high.

The Royal Gazette has now obtained up-to-date figures from Registrar General Marlene Christopher on the number of actual infant deaths on the Island (see accompanying table).

In 2007, there were four infant deaths in the first year, one more than the previous year. In both 2003 and 2005, there were two deaths and in 2004 there were none.

The infant mortality rates for the past five years for the Island, where less than 1,000 babies are born every year, are therefore: 4.7 for 2007, 3.8 for 2006, 2.4 for 2005, zero for 2004 and 2.4 for 2003.

The information has been passed to the US Census Bureau, which provides estimates for the CIA World Factbook, a global almanac published annually and used by millions of people all over the world as a reference source.

Peter Johnson, from the US Census Bureau's International Program Center, said the bureau's estimates had been "uniformly higher" than the official figures.

"We will need to look at that more closely," he said. "We are, in fact, revising our estimates for the next update. The problem really is that there are so few births and infant deaths that it's hard to nail down a figure for a particular year. One of the problems is that I think the best piece of data we had is from quite a while ago. We are in the process of revising our estimate so this will probably change."

The bureau uses information on births and deaths from the United Nations Demographic Yearbooks.

The yearbook for 2006 gives the number of infant deaths in Bermuda as six but Ms Christopher explained that three were actually still births which should not have been included.

A spokeswoman for Bermuda Hospitals Board said they were waiting to hear back from the CIA about the 2008 estimate. "We are working to have the information corrected," she said.

She added: "Infant mortality rates per 1,000 live births follow a child from birth to one-year-old.

"They are therefore collated by the Registrar General's office as a death of an infant might not occur at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital. "The hospital has not had community requests for this information previously and requests for this figure should be directed to the Registrar General."

Ms Cannonier, from Bermuda Health Co-op, said the Factbook got it wrong but added that getting information from officials here was difficult.

She told this newspaper: "Our infant mortality rate in Bermuda is not very high at all. It's fine. We don't have a problem. It was not written correctly on the CIA website.

"We just took it off what the website says because no one was giving us the actual figures in Bermuda. It was all under lock and key. No one said what the infant mortality rate was. Doctors hold it close to their chests. We put out what was there. If it's wrong, the doctors have to correct it."

Marie Harf, from the CIA Office of Public Affairs, told The Royal Gazette that the International Programs Center of the US Census Bureau was among the best in the world at preparing such estimates.

"Their estimates are based on models used to identify trends in demographic change," she said. "We've shared this query with the Census Bureau."