As world leaders gathered for this month’s World Summit at the United Nations, an unprecedented coalition of governments and health organisations joined together to highlight the importance of reducing child and maternal deaths as part of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

To speed up progress in cutting the number of preventable deaths, top advocates for women and children have launched the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn & Child health on the 12 September 2005.

The new partnership will look to unite together the world’s leading organisations that are focused on this issue, and help to combine efforts to provide resources, strategies and political commitments needed to decrease the maternal and child mortality rates across the world.

Although a number of countries have progressed significantly towards the MDGs, however, there are still many that fall far short of achieving the 2015 MDG targets for maternal and child health.

Ann M. Veneman the Executive Director of UNICEF stated, “Each year over half a million women die in pregnancy or childbirth and 10.6 million children die before their fifth birthday. To accelerate progress, we need to integrate our efforts at the global, national and community level.”

Joy Phumaphi, Assistant Director-General of the World Health Organisation said, “Only a focussed, coordinated effort can bring women, newborns and children the health care they need during pregnancy, delivery, the early weeks of life and in childhood. Working with countries on integrated initiatives like this has the potential to transform millions of lives and make critical progress.”

UNICEF report that at least two-thirds of deaths could be avoided by simply providing low-cost, existing interventions.

Alpha Oumar Konaré, Chairperson, Commission of the African Union said, “Despite affordable and available life-saving interventions, countless mothers, babies and children continue to die each day simply because of where they are born and live. This not only represents an unacceptable disparity but shows that we are not even meeting the first benchmark of development – keeping children and women alive.”

The World Health Organisation’s World Health Report 2005 estimates that to reach the MDG targets for maternal and child health, it would require an additional US$9 billion on average per year from now until 2015.

Millions of women and children who live in the poorest environments could be saved with a simple low-technology, low-cost intervention based on family care and community outreach programs. Very simple action plans such as the prevention of malaria and tetanus; keeping the newborn warm; exclusive breastfeeding; early recognition of illness and seeking care can make huge inroads with modest resources.

The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn & Child Health will bring together national leaders, donors, UN agencies, professional associations, academic institutions, and non-governmental organisations. It will immediately begin its work on accelerating integrated action for maternal, newborn and child health at national and global levels, based on the MDGs.

UNICEF tell how the world summit this month holds an unparalleled opportunity for world leaders to follow through on existing promises and take immediate action to prevent countless numbers of maternal and child deaths.

Konaré said, “Greater political leadership coupled with increased financial resources is needed at international and national levels if we are going to meet these goals. Investment in maternal, newborn and child health is not only a priority for saving lives, but it is also critical to advancing other goals related to human welfare, equity, and poverty reduction.”



[Source: Unicef - Please Visit by clicking here]