In its annual World Health Report 2005, this year titled “Make Every Mother and Child Count,” the World Health Organization (WHO) states that the lives of millions of newborn babies and thousands of women around the world could be saved each year by improving access to basic health care, reports the World Bank press review Thursday.
WHO chief Lee Jong Wook said that worldwide half-a-million women die each year during pregnancy and childbirth, and that more than three million babies are stillborn (dødfødte) and four million newborns die within the first days or weeks of their lives.
Altogether 10,6 million children a year die before their fifth birthday. According to the report, almost 90 percent of deaths among under-fives in the world are due to just six conditions, including acute neo-natal conditions such as premature birth, asphyxia at birth and infections (37 percent), pneumonia (19 percent), diarrhea (18 percent), malaria (eight percent), measles and HIV/AIDS.
The report says, that “most of these deaths are avoidable through existing interventions that are simple, affordable and effective.” They include oral rehydration therapy, antibiotics, anti-malarial drugs and insecticide-treated bed nets, vitamin A and other micronutrients, promotion of breastfeeding, immunization, and skilled care during pregnancy and childbirth.
A “continuum of care” approach, which needed massive investment in health care, is needed for mother and child, beginning before pregnancy and extending through childbirth in to the babys childhood. This approach includes the deployment of many more health professionals, including doctors, midwives and nurses.
The WHO estimates that out of a total of 136 million births a year worldwide, less than two thirds of women in less developed countries and only one third in the least developed countries have their babies delivered by a skilled attendant.
Wim van Lerberghe, chief editor of the report said that while little research has been carried out into whether low standards of maternal health care hamper economic development, “everything points in that direction.”
According to the WHO, health spending by poor countries needs to double over the next 10 years to meet internationally agreed targets for reducing deaths of mothers and young children.
The organization says that spending in the 75 worst-affected countries needs to increase by 9 billion US dollar a year to 2015 from the present 97 billion dollar to make the necessary progress towards universal access to care for mothers, newborns and young children.
The UN millennium development goals have set out to reduce under-five child mortality by two-thirds and maternal mortality by three quarters by 2015, compared with 1990 levels.
But the report shows slowing progress on reducing child mortality in recent years, especially in Africa and the eastern Mediterranean region, and little improvement in cutting maternal deaths.
Denis Aitken, who heads the WHO director-generals office, said that at the present rate of progress sub-Saharan African countries would not reach the UNs target for child mortality for 150 years.
Of 187 countries studied, 93 are on track to meet the UN target for child mortality, 51 are making slow progress and in 43 mostly African nations mortality rates are stagnant or increasing, the report notes.
The WHO further says more than half of all child deaths are concentrated in just six countries – China, the DR Congo, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria and Pakistan.
Nineteen of the 20 countries with the highest maternal mortality ratios are in sub-Saharan African and countries reporting a rise in newborn, child and maternal mortality rates included Kenya, Rwanda, Swaziland, Turkmenistan, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Kilde: www.worldbank.org
