WHO calls on governments to cut infant mortality to 10 per 1,000 live births

MANILA, Philippines–The World Health Organization (WHO) urged governments around the world, on Tuesday, to improve the measures to help cut neonatal mortality rates to 10, or fewer, newborn deaths per 1,000 live births.

AFP FILE PHOTO

In a statement, the WHO said health authorities from all over the world approved the Every Newborn Action Plan (ENAP) at the World Health Assembly last May, which set two specific targets for all countries to achieve by 2035.

Under the action plan, governments must reduce neonatal mortality rates to 10 per 1,000 live births and lower stillbirth rates to 10, or fewer, per 1,000 total births.

While maternal and child mortality rates have been dramatically reduced over the last two decades, “newborns have missed out on this attention,” it said.

Based on WHO records, 2.9 million newborns—particularly during the first four weeks—die every year around the world, while there are 2.6 million stillbirths, referring to the last three months of pregnancy, annually.

Newborn deaths currently account for 44 percent of all deaths of children under 5 years old globally.

“The day of birth is the time of greatest risk of death and disability for babies and their mothers, contributing to around half of the world’s 289,000 maternal deaths,” the WHO said.

It said the majority of newborn deaths were caused by preventable and treatable conditions, such as prematurity, complications around birth and severe infections.

More than 71 percent of these could be avoided without intensive care but mainly through quality care around birth and care of small and sick newborns, the agency said.

In the Philippines, the top three leading causes of infant mortality are bacterial sepsis, pneumonia and respiratory distress, according to data gathered by the Department of Health in 2010.

In 2009, newborn deaths were estimated at 40,000 each year.

But the latest DOH records showed that the country’s child mortality rate had declined to 30 per 1,000 live births in 2011, from 32 in 2009, moving the Philippines closer to meeting its Millennium Development Goal of 27 deaths per 1,000 live births.

The DOH has attributed the improvement to sustained immunization of babies and schoolchildren in the country.