GHANA: HEALTH:
Efforts to reduce child mortality not enough

5/18/2012 10:09:13 AM
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GHANA - Ghana has become the first African country to introduce two new vaccines for rotavirus and pneumococcal disease. While this is a major step towards reducing the country’s under-five mortality rate, experts say more still needs to be done. - Currently, 80 out of every 1 000 children do not make it past the age of five in Ghana, and, in order to achieve the fourth United Nations Millennium Development Goal (MDG) by 2015, the country would have to cut its under-five mortality rate down to 40 deaths per 1 000. The West African country is pinning its hopes on the two new vaccines which are expected to prevent 12 000 pneumonia-related deaths and another 10 000 deaths from diarrhoea. Rotavirus and pneumococcal disease are the leading causes of diarrhoea and pneumonia in young Ghanaian children. Together they account for close to 25% of under-five mortality and are behind only malaria as the leading causes of child deaths in Ghana. (END/RADIO BULLETIN EDITOR/2012)

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