What has been done about Goal 4 in the past?
Did you know that a child in sub-Saharan Africa is 26 more times likely to die than a child living in a rich country? The object of Goal Four is to reduce the child mortality rate by two thirds by 2015. People in many countries are working on this goal and have done successful things in the past. Amazingly and sadly, 94 percent of child deaths occur in developing countries so therefore those are the places that need to work the hardest to change with our help.
Egypt is one of the hardest working countries that decreased their child mortality rate by a huge percentage by doing many things to help their country. Egypt created roads that could quickly get to hospitals in order to deliver babies safely and give children medicine quickly. They invested in clean water and public health campaigns to teach the importance of washing your hands. Egypt renovated their rundown clinics in order to use them again. They even tried to make sure that mothers had midwives or other skilled workers to attend their births. Egypt was known for putting their children as a huge priority. Because of Egypt’s great efforts, their child mortality decreased by 72 in the years 1990-2005. They had 105 in 1990 and in 2005 had 33. That means they decreased their child mortality by 68 percent.
Globally, we have done many things and across the world we are coming up with many ideas in order to decrease child mortality. One idea is that women should have less babies and it would decrease that child mortality rate because then families can pay additional attention to their child/children. This way they could invest more in them and pay more attention to them instead of having many kids and not being able to give them very much (such as healthcare). As a result of ideas that we have had, at the end of the 1980’s child mortality dropped 20 percent, saving 12 million lives.
Some other countries that have been successful are Bangladesh, Nepal and Malawi. Bangladesh has had women space out their births and have fewer children, strengthening the mother and child’s health. Nepal has given vaccinations to children with diseases and given vitamin A drops to almost every child in Nepal. They even diagnosed pneumonia and dispensed medicines for it and by doing these things Nepal halved their child mortality rate. Malawi has a huge shortage of doctors and nurses so their gains were particularly surprising. Malawi has made gains by doing simple things such as distributing nets that protect children from the mosquitoes containing malaria. This shows that even the simplest things can help change child mortality rates for the better.
Sadly, some countries have not improved at all, such as Iraq. It increased 150 percent in 15 years. In Iraq, in 2005, 122,000 children died before their fifth birthday. We need to change this and donate to countries that really need our help. Overall, many developing countries have extremely improved, but still at this rate, Goal 4 will not be completed by 2015. Even though many countries have improved, some still need much help. To help, we can donate money to organizations to help stop diseases such as an organization called UNICEF.
There are four main diseases that need to be fought and we need to improve birth conditions. The first disease that needs to be fought is aids and we can pay for vaccinations to help. Another disease is tuberculosis and we can pay for vaccinations. The third disease is malaria and it is the leading killer. We can pay for mosquito nets and vaccinations for it. Diarrhea is the last disease and we can invest in clean water and teach about health. Lastly, we need to improve birth conditions by getting more doctors and hospitals to safely deliver the babies.
