selected demographic characteristics (Table 1) suggests that
the WIC population comes from demographic groups at
higher risk for poor pregnancy outcomes. The WIC prenatal
population is younger and less educated, contains more
unmarried and minority women, and has a larger number of
high parity births compared to all women who reside in the
same WIC catchment area or statewide and gave birth in
1978. The Massachusetts WIC program sites in 1978 were
located in more disadvantaged areas of the state and, within
the program, the higher risk subpopulations were proportionally
more heavily represented. Almost 18 per cent of all
women who gave birth in 1978 in WIC catchment areas were
WIC prenatal participants.