How physicians can help with efforts to decrease child mortality in India

The United Nation’s Millennium Development Goal 4 (MDG4) calls for a reduction in childhood mortality by two-thirds between 1990 and 2015. A recent paper from the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF’s Child Health Epidemiology Reference Group tracks worldwide progress in childhood mortality. The investigators found that the number of deaths worldwide in children under 5 years decreased by 26% between 2000 and 2010, but only a handful of causes of mortality decreased enough to attain MDG4.

 “In order to continue to avail of the benefits of antibiotics, it is critical to use antibiotics rationally.”
-Anand Krishnan, MD, is additional professor and head of the WHOCC for Capacity Development and Research in Community Based NCDPC at the Centre for Community Medicine in the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi, India

The group provided estimates for India regarding deaths in children under the age of 5 years:

• 1.7 million children died in India in 2010—more than half of them in their first 28 days of life;
• pneumonia accounted for 23.6% of deaths in this age group, preterm birth complications for 18.1%, and diarrhea for 12.6%.

Anand Krishnan, MD, is additional professor and head of the WHOCC for Capacity Development and Research in Community Based NCDPC at the Centre for Community Medicine in the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi, India. In an exclusive interview with mdCurrent-India, he noted that a dearth of epidemiologic data presents...