Regional meeting to accelerate reduction in newborn and child mortality towards achieving SDG 2030 targets

Overview

There has been significant reduction in under-five mortality in the Region – 70% reduction between 1990 and 2017 yet an estimated 1.3 million under-five deaths happened in 2017. Reduction in newborn mortality has been relatively slower – a reduction of 60% in the same period, with an estimated 0.76 million newborn deaths in 2017.

WHO-SEARO has considered acceleration in ending preventable maternal and child mortality as a high priority action and has instituted Regional Flagship to drive the progress in the Region. Under the Flagship WHO-SEARO has considered Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Myanmar, Nepal and Timor-Leste as high priority countries because of relatively high burden of child mortality. WHO, along with partners has provided focused support to these countries to analyze the situation and adopt country specific high impact approaches to address causes of newborn and child mortality moving forwards towards achieving the SDG targets.

Over the last five years the support from WHO to countries has been effective in enabling countries to accelerate the reduction in newborn and child mortality as we move towards achieving the SDG 2030 targets for ending preventable child mortality – reduce under-five mortality rate to 25 per 1000 live births, or lower and newborn mortality rate to 12 per 1000 live births, or lower. In comparison, in 2017 the Regional U5MR was 36 per 1000 live births and NMR was 21 per 1000 live births.