Beryl Thyer

Memorial Africa Trust

Babies: Statistics

I start this page by setting before you a comparison of the statistics for the survival of newborn babies in the developed world and their survival in the developing world. You will soon come to see that the figures are alarming. For decades millions of newborn babies have been lost through circumstances easily preventable.

The medical world is now addressing this problem. Things should start to happen on a big scale. In the meantime the Beryl Thyer Memorial Africa Trust continues to do what it can in the same two hospitals where we also tackle the Burkitt's Lymphoma problem.

Childhood Mortality Statistics

The under 5 mortality rate is calculated as the number of children who die before their 5th birthday for every 1000 live births.

In the Cameroon there are 150 - 200 deaths before age 5 years, for every 1000 births. So 1 in 5 die before 5th birthday

In the United Kingdom there are 6 - 7 deaths before age 5 years, for every 1000 births.

Notes:

W Africa, where Cameroon is located, has the worst of ALL childhood mortality statistics.

Cameroon's childhood mortality rate is ranked among the worst in the world.

The United Kingdom has amongst the lowest childhood mortality rates in the world

40% of all deaths in Cameroon, before age 5, occur in the first year of life (the Infant Mortality Rate).

66% of all deaths in Cameroon, before 1 year of age, occur in the first month of life (the Neonatal Mortality Rate)

66% of the deaths in the 1st month of life occur in the first week of life (the Perinatal Mortality Rate)

66% of the deaths in the 1st week of life actually occur in the first day of life

4 million babies die before they are one month old. Each year.

4 million babies are born dead. Each year - a problem scarcely addressed.

Notes:

Neonatal Mortality Rate for West Europe = 5/1000 births ; for UK this means 5, 000 deaths before age 28 days of age per year.

Neonatal Mortality rate for West Africa = 54/1000 births ; for Africa this means 465,000 deaths before 28 days of age per year.

Conclusions:

If we want to improve the under 5 mortality rate, we would do well to tackle illness in the very young, because this is where the greatest loss of life in children lies.

Source: The State of the World's Newborns 2001. Save the Children Fund (the first global overview of Infant mortality ever presented)

The total number of children under 5 years of age living in Germany, France, Greece, and Italy in 2003, was 10.6 million

The total number of children in the world who died before they were 5 years old, was 10.6 million. Source: UNICEF State of the World's Children 2005

The following graph illustrates the statistical likely outcome for 200 children under 5 years of age, in Cameroon and for most sub-Saharan African countries. Sixty-six can be expected to have died before they are 28 days old, about 40%. The remaining 134 will take the remaining 1790 days up to their 5th birthday to die. Clearly there is a huge need for us to pay attention to the newborn.

Consider 200 child deaths in 1 year:

Deaths under 5 years	= 200
Deaths under 1 year	= 100 (50%)
Deaths under 1 month	= 66 (33%)
Deaths under 1 week	= 44 (22%)
Deaths in under 1 day	= 30 (11%)
Deaths on day 1	= 30 (15% of 200)

So more than 40% of 200 deaths at 5 years are from the under 1 month period

These 40% of deaths occur during the 1st 28 days of life!

The remaining 60% of deaths occur over the next 1,700 days!

The following graph indicates progress in the mortality of children less than 5 years old, from 1960 to the present time.

The final block indicates the projected reduction in child deaths - under 5, early and late neonatal deaths - required to meet Millennium Development Goal no.4, by 2015, from a baseline at 1990; i.e. a 66% improvement in all categories. All governments in the world are committed to this - and all other goals.

The international workers in this Programme - Countdown to 2015 - including the Word Health Organisation, UNICEF, Save the Children, the International Paediatric Association, the British Dept for International Development, The Lancet - and others, are focused on achieving this target.

From the graph it can be seen that:

The under-5 situation is improving (green block) and that the goal may just be reached by 2015.

It is equally clear that the neonatal statistics will not reach the target. The mauve blocks (older neonates) show only a slight improvement over the years.

The pale blue blocks (early neonates) show no improvement whatever and will not reach the target - unless mighty steps are taken in the management of healthy and sick newborns.

The Beryl Thyer Memorial Africa Trust aims to play its part to the full, in neonatal survival measures, in NW Camereoon.

Are you horrified about the above statistics?

Do you wonder what is being done and will be done about them, and how the Beryl Thyer Memorial Trust and its workers in Cameroon can play its part?

Then please read on!

o0o

Thought for the day:

'To save one life is as if you have saved the world'

Source: The Talmud, 200AD. How very appropriate to the saving of newborn babies.

(Babies: Statistics)

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Beryl Thyer Memorial Africa Trust, a UK registered charity ~ 1112603