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The U.S is No. 32!
The United States is 32nd best country to be a girl — behind Algeria, Kazakhstan and Serbia — according to a new report by international children’s rights group Save the Children.
The U.S.’s lack of women in national government heavily contributed to the low position in the 144-country ranking list.
Women hold just 104 of the 535 seats in Congress, an underwhelming 19.4%. Meanwhile, No. 1 Sweden’s parliament is 44% female, and 41.5% of ministers in No. 2 Finland are women.
“As well as women’s representation in parliament, the USA is let down by relatively high adolescent fertility and maternal mortality rates compared to other countries in its income group,” Save the Children wrote in the report.
In the U.S., 14 out of every 100,000 pregnant women die during child birth. Countries that scored higher — such as No. 2 Finland or even No. 22 Poland — have about three deaths per 100,000 births.
The U.S. scored just behind Kazakhstan and Algeria, Nos. 30 and 31 respectively. Many Eastern European countries beat out the New World nation: Slovenia took the No. 7 spot, Serbia came in at No. 20 and Belarus was ranked No. 24.
Save the Children used five factors to determine the rankings: child marriage rates, teen pregnancy rates, secondary school graduation rates, maternal mortality and the number of women in government.
The U.S. wasn’t the only wealthy country to rank relatively poorly on the list. The UK came in at No. 15, Canada at No. 19 and Australia at No. 21 — all three can be chalked up to a low proportion of female governmental officials and relatively high rates of teen pregnancy, the group said.
Niger was named the worst country for girls, ranking poorly in all five categories. Somalia, Mali, the Central African Republic and Chad rounded out the bottom five.
