World Health Organisation(WHO) has called upon countries to double their efforts to cut down child mortality.
Speaking at the at a four-day regional child survival meeting that attracted eight African Francophone countries Dr Phanuel Habimana Child and Adolescent Programme Manager at WHO Rwanda Office, said that much as there are tremendous achievements in the region, there were still more efforts needed to cut-down child mortality rate.
Habimana reminded countries in the region that Millennium Development Goal 4 is to see child deaths cut-down by two-thirds come 2015.
“There has been lots of progress in slashing mortality rate in Rwanda. The rate has been steadily going down by seven percent per year,” Habimana said.
Habimana advised that the countries should pay attention to the two killer diseases pneumonia and diarrhea which remains a big threat to child death.
Out of 8.8 millionchild deaths, 1.6 million were caused by pneumonia and 1.3 million by diarrhea, according to 2008 statistics from WHO.
Doctor Agnes Binagwaho, Rwanda’s Minister of Health pointed that the number of pneumonia cases among children has drastically reduced, however adding that a lot more efforts still needed.
Binagwaho also added that child mortality rate in Rwanda had been reduced by 50 percent.
She however called upon public to play their role especially in hygiene much as the government and its partners play their role in fighting these diseases citing an example of diarrhea.
“Rwanda is doing a great job especially with children vaccination programmes. It was among the first countries in Africa to use the pneumonia vaccine and the results are remarkable.” Said Angela Hwang Childhood Pneumonia the Programme Officer, at Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
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