According to the latest United Nations (UN) estimates, more than 6 million children died before the age of 5 last year, most of them from causes that could have been avoided.
Pneumonia, diarrhea and malaria are the main pathologies responsible for these premature deaths, but undernutrition is still responsible for more than one in two deaths in children under 5 years old. Complications during and after childbirth are also a common cause and one that could be avoided, according to the UN, “by ensuring that every birth is attended by qualified personnel and that the mother has access to hospital care. emergency “. This is in line with the objectives of the World Health Organization and Unicef which, last June, launched a Plan to end neonatal mortality by 2035.
Among the figures unveiled by the UN report, we learn that:
– The global under-5 mortality rate fell by almost half between 1990 and 2013, from 12.7 million to 6.3 million.
– About half of deaths of children under 5 are recorded in India, Pakistan, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of Congo and China.
– Of the 6 million children who died last year, 2.8 million (nearly one in two) were newborns less than one month old.
– Sub-Saharan Africa has succeeded in reducing the number of infant deaths by 48% since 1990, but the infant mortality rate remains high with 92 deaths per 1,000 births, an average of 15 times higher than some Western countries.
– In Rwanda, where 64% of parliamentarians are women, the mortality rate fell from 152 per 1000 births in 1990 to 52 per 1000 in 2013, following the implementation of a policy of access to water drinking water and the development of family planning.
