Every five seconds a child or a Pregnant woman dies

The world is less and less mothers dying, according to the United Nations shortly before, during or after childbirth. The infant mortality rate decreases. From a recent report of the children’s Fund Unicef and the world health organization, WHO, show help that the mortality rates reached a new low. Since the year 2000, the deaths of children fell almost by half, the mothers of more than one-third.

Still dies every five seconds, according to the still somewhere in the world a pregnant woman or a child. In 2018, have lost according to the report, 6.2 million children under 15 years of age from mostly preventable reasons, your life, of which 5.3 million are younger than five years. Approximately 295.000 women died, therefore, in 2017, to complications during pregnancy or childbirth – that is, about two out of a thousand pregnancies or births ended with the death of the mother.

For children, the risk of dying in the first month after birth is particularly high, especially if you were born early, too small, or with a congenital body defect, if there were complications at the birth or if the babies have picked up an infection. Of the babies who do not survive their first month die about a third of the day of the birth.

Not all expectant mothers have the same opportunities

The chances of Survival for mothers and children are distributed according to the report, is very unequal: In sub-Saharan Africa, they are significantly worse than in other Parts of the world. 80 percent of all deaths of mothers and children were recorded, therefore, in southern Africa, and southern Asia.

For women in sub-Saharan Africa, it is according to the report, 50 times more dangerous to have a child than for women in industrialised countries. In addition, their children have a ten times as high risk of death. In 2018, one of 13 children under the age of five died according to the report, in southern Africa. For comparison: In Europe, one of the 196 children die, on average, before his fifth birthday, in Germany it is one of 250 live-born children.

In the past decades, it has managed to reduce child and maternal mortality significantly. Between 1990 and 2018, the deaths of children fell below the age of 15 to 56 percent from 14.2 million to 6.2 million. The greatest progress made East Asian and Southeast Asian countries.

The progress is too slow

Worldwide, the decline in maternal and child mortality mainly due to better medical care for the pregnancy to be due to more safety in the delivery and access to antibiotics.

“In countries where there is a reliable, affordable, high-quality health care for all, women and babies survive and develop well,” said the WHO Director General, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

According to the UN, but progress is still too slow to reach the established by the United Nations development goals to reduce child and maternal mortality by the year 2030.