One-in-four children in Sierra Leone do not live past age of five
Across the globe, poor care for new-borns, malaria, diarrhoea, malnutrition and even measles claim lives before a fifth birthday, according to a UN report released today.
The United Nations Children’s Fund reported “alarmingly slow progress on reducing child deaths”. One in 12 children worldwide doesn’t make it to age five, with half of all under-five deaths in sub-Saharan Africa.
“It is incredible that in an age of technological and medical marvels, child survival is so tenuous in so many places, especially for the poor and marginalised,” said Unicef director Carol Bellamy, launching the report.
Child mortality refers to the number of children who die before their fifth birthday, and is measured per 1,000 live births. In 2002, industrialised countries had seven deaths per 1,000 births, while the poorest nations had 158 in every 1,000 births.
The Unicef study is a report card on whether countries are fulfilling a goal adopted by world leaders at the UN Millennium Summit in 2000 calling for child mortality to be reduced by two-thirds by 2015.
Iraq, which has lost two wars since 1991 and was under UN sanctions for more than a decade, lost the most ground of any nation. It was the only country in the Middle East and North Africa where the child mortality rate increased from 1990 to 2002. One in 10 Iraqi children under five died in 2002 while in 1990 the rate was one in 20.
In more than a third of countries in sub-Saharan Africa, child mortality rates have increased or stagnated, the report said.
The 10 countries with the most under-five deaths since 2002 were Sierra Leone with 284 per 1,000 births, Niger 265, Angola 260, Afghanistan 257, Somalia 225, Haiti 222, Guinea-Bissau 211, Burkina Faso 202, and Congo 205. Poor care for new-borns is the single most prominent cause.
