‘Invest more to ensure Africa’s babies survive’
Selected African
Countries IMR 2013 TFR 2013 FLR 2013 Delivery/ Faculties
2013 N/A
THE UN officially declared July 18 Nelson Mandela International Day in November 2009, recognising Mandela’s “values and his dedication to the service of humanity” and acknowledging his contribution “to the Struggle for democracy internationally and the promotion of a culture of peace throughout the world” (South Africa info, 2015).
“Mandela has spent 67 years making the world a better place. We’re spending just 67 minutes,” it said. Nelson Mandela’s birthday is on July 18, and the call is for people everywhere to celebrate by acting on the idea that each person has the power to change the world.
It is a special day, and with just 67 minutes spent on it, this article focuses mainly on the top 10 selected African countries with key issues such as high infant mortality rate for each 1 000 live births and high total fertility rate, based on the World Bank 2013 data.
However, improvements in the health of pregnant women and new mothers will play an important role in generating further reductions in child mortality (UN, 2007).
Many African countries are not yet on track to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) target of a two-thirds reduction in the rate of child mortality by the end of this year.
The objective of the study is to examine the infant mortality, total fertility, female literacy and delivery in health-care facilities across the selected African countries.
We analysed data from the World Bank, of 2013 ( http:// data. worldbank. org/). Some selected variables such as high infant mortality rate, high total fertility rate and low female education were used.
The top 10 selected African countries based on the latest reports of high infant mortality (IMR), high total fertility rate (TFR), and low female literacy rate (FLR) were Sierra Leone, Angola, Central African Republic, Somalia, Chad, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mali, Nigeria, Niger and Burundi. In addition to that,
Sierra Leone
107.2
The infant mortality rate (IMR) is very high due to poor maternal health education. graphical presentations with comparable figures were also included.
According to the data, Sierra Leone (107.2), Angola (102) and Central African Republic (96.1) reported the highest IMR for every 1 000 live births. This is quite high compare to other countries in the world. The total fertility rate in Niger (7.6), Mali (6.8) and Somalia (6.6) were higher compared with other countries. Unfortunately, Niger’s (11 percent) female literacy rate is very low, then Central African Republic (24.4 percent), Somalia (26 percent), and Mali
4.7
37.7
52.5 (29.2 percent) reported a somewhat high female literacy rate.
In terms of institutional delivery and health-care facilities, Chad (12.2 percent) and Niger (33 percent) were very low, while the DRC (80.4 percent), and Burundi (65 percent) reported a very high percentage, but the infant mortality rate for DRC is surprisingly very high. This might be due to low-quality services in health care and a lack of skilled manpower.
The study findings clearly show that the DRC is using health-care facilities and promoting institu- tional delivery, but unfortunately, infant mortality rate is quite high as such service providers need to work very hard in providing goodquality health services. In addition to that, Burundi shows positive results in delivery of care and infant mortality rates, but this is not sufficient.
In order to achieve the MDG 2, 4 and 5, these countries really need to work hard particularly in promoting basic maternal health education, including family planning. Health-care service providers need to pay more attention during pregnancy periods, improve number of field visits, identify pregnant women and promote 100 percent antenatal care.
If this is done practically, these countries will reduce, and ultimately eliminate infant mortality. References
South Africa info. 2015. http://www.southafrica.info/mandela/67minutes.htm#.Vai9qbUXVp 8#ixzz3g8VRyDCT
UN Chronicle: The Magazine of the United Nations, 2007. Education Is Key to Reducing Child Mortality: The Link Between Maternal Health and Education, Vol. XIIV, No. 4.
World bank data sheet 2013, (http://data.worldbank.org/
Professor Susuman has an MA, MPhil in population studies and a PhD in demography. Chialepeh, Bado and Abraham are PhD scholars