NZ child homicide rate 7th highest
The wellbeing of New Zealand’s children places us 34th out of 41 developed countries, according to a report released by Unicef yesterday.
The report tracks the progress on goals such as reducing child poverty, inequality and deprivation and improving education and health for children.
The 34th placing puts us behind Greece, Hungary and Lithuania – but ahead of the United States, Israel and Turkey.
Unicef said New Zealand’s presence in the bottom end of the rankings was proof that ‘‘high national income is no guarantee of a good record in sustaining child wellbeing.’’
Here are some of the areas that New Zealand fares worst.
Health and wellbeing
New Zealand ranks 38th ahead of only Bulgaria and Chile, while Mexico was not ranked.
This ranking reflects performance in neonatal mortality, suicide, mental health, drunkenness and teen pregnancy.
New Zealand has the highest rate of adolescent suicide of any country in the report.
The report used figures from 2010 of 15.6 suicides per 100,000 people – about two and a half times the average of 6.1.
The most recent figures for New Zealand are slightly up on 2010, with 16 suicides per 100,000 in 2016. The rate is so high that it brings the entire global average up by 0.26 deaths per 100,000.
New Zealand’s neonatal mortality rate is slightly higher than average while our teen pregnancy rate places us sixth behind Turkey, Romania, Bulgaria, Chile and Mexico.
Rates of teenage pregnancy have been falling in New Zealand and all other developed nations in the past decade.
Obesity
New Zealand has a very high rate of childhood obesity, with 32 per cent of 2-14-year-olds overweight or obese. However, as New Zealand only reports obesity rates for 11-14 year-olds no direct comparison was possible with other countries.
‘‘Innocenti’s League Table gives a global average of just 15.2 per cent for children aged 11-15, and the worst rates – Malta (27.4 per cent) Canada (25.05 per cent) and Greece (20.93 per cent) – are nowhere near as high as New Zealand’s for 2-14 year olds.’’
Economic growth and work
New Zealand performed poorly with a ranking of 34, owing to the 16 per cent of children living in jobless households. Only Hungary and Ireland fare worse.
Hunger
About 11 per cent of Kiwi children under 15 live in a home with food insecurity, slightly lower than the overall average of 12.7 per cent.
Reducing inequality
New Zealand is ranked 26th in this goal, just behind Latvia, Slovakia and Poland and ahead of Portugal, Spain and Estonia.
The share of income that goes to the top 10 per cent of households with children is nearly 20 per cent higher than the share of income in the bottom 40 per cent.
This inequality flows into our education system where socioeconomic advantage has a big impact on performance in reading, maths and science.
Poverty
New Zealand was not ranked against the goal of ending poverty as it only provided data in one of three indicators. That was relative income poverty, with 19.8 per cent of Kiwi children living in a household with an income lower the 60 per cent of the median. The average was 21 per cent.
Promote peace, justice and strong institutions
This ranking comes from rates of child homicide and bullying. New Zealand did not report a rate for bullying but our high rate of child homicide was enough to see us ranked 33rd on this goal.
With 0.78 child homicides per 100,000 children in 2010, New Zealand was seventh highest in the report, Mexico (5.98) and the United States (2.66) had the highest rates of child homicide.
Ensure quality education
New Zealand is ranked 15th on this goal with an above average 71.9 per cent of 15 year olds achieving baseline competency in reading, maths and science. However that figure, which is for 2015, has fallen from almost 80 per cent in 2006.
Clean air
New Zealand’s air pollution levels are well below the average for urban areas.
Gender equality
About 7.4 per cent of adult New Zealand males and 3.7 per cent of adult females agree with the statement ‘‘university education is more important for a boy that for a girl’’. While still significant, the figure is below the report average of 13.9 per cent.