In 2015, India Lost A Million Children Who Could Have been Saved: UNICEF Wednesday June 29,2016

 

Around 1.2 million children in India could have been saved in 2015 had the basic minimum sanitation and healthcare facilities been provided for, says the UNICEF’s State of the World’s Children Report 2016 that was released Wednesday June 29,2016

India – along with Congo, Ethiopia, Nigeria and Pakistan – account for more than half the 5.9 million children who died last year before attaining the age of five years.

Around 39% were babies who died due to complications during birth. Most of the rest, the report said, died from diseases like malaria and diarrhoea, which are easy to control, but have become prime killers through lack of proper sanitation and access to healthcare.

Worldwide, the other causes of children’s deaths included pneumonia, meningitis, tetanus, measles, sepsis and AIDS.

The report suggested that the overwhelming majority of child deaths can be prevented through well-known, low-cost and easily deliverable interventions and facilities like sanitation, holistic nutrition and women’s reproductive health management.