Pakistan is the worst place in the world for new born babies—that is the frightful finding of the latest UNICEF survey launched on Monday. If this doesn’t shake policymakers in federal and provisional highest echelons of power, whatever will?
The study reveals that one in 22 babies in Pakistan face the possibility of death within the first 28 days of birth. The war-stricken Afghanistan stands below Pakistan as the third worst country. In high income countries, this number is only 3 in 1000 babies.
Many of the other low performers in the world also happen to be some of the poorest countries from Sub-Saharan Africa. But Pakistan is not the poorest country in the world, neither is it war-torn like its neighbour, so why is it the most dangerous country in the world for new-born babies?
The challenge for Pakistan is in fact this: that despite improved poverty levels year after year—from 57.9 percent to 29.5 percent between 1999 and 2014; and improvement in multidimensional poverty as well—neonatal mortality and infant mortality remain dangerously high. Meanwhile, stunting in children under-5 stands at an astounding 45 percent. Malnutrition in the country according to data from the Global Hunger Index is at 22 percent of the population.
No doubt, with greater poverty in rural areas, the intensity of deprivation in terms of health and access to health care is much worse. Medical facilities are not available or accessible; home births are prevalent and trained practitioners and midwives who can deliver babies are in dire shortage. But this is not just a Rural-Pakistan problem. According to the Global Nutrition Report, almost 45 percent of the time, skilled attendants at birth are not available in Pakistan. Surely, the issue is far-reaching.
Circumstances in which babies are delivered matter. Were they born in a sterile, hygienic environment? A major cause of neonatal mortality is babies contracting sepsis or other infections due to poor delivery settings. Secondly, is there clean drinking water nearby? The Council of Research in Water Resources (PCRWR) conducted a survey and found that 84 percent of water that is supplied in the country is not fit for consumption. That assuredly throws out the argument that things might be different for urban dwellers.
The health of the mothers is also a major cause for infant and neonatal mortality. Data from report mentioned above shows that 52 percent of the reproductive mothers in Pakistan are anemic. That’s more than half the mothers in the country!
If we move down the chain; mortality of children under-five also remains high (78.8 deaths per 1000 births) because of the lack of sanitation, clean water and overall malnutrition. The same survey tells that nearly 50 percent of pre-school children in Pakistan have a vitamin-A deficiency.
Numbers have been told and retold and each time they are astoundingly similar. The problem lies in provinces not taking over their responsibility in correcting policies conducive to improvement in these key areas. Granting or diverting funding toward building and strengthening medical facilities, making them accessible, training of more delivery practitioners, help provide mothers and pregnant women to essential nutrients like iron, folic acid, vitamin B12 etc. to those who cannot buy them, providing access to basic human needs like clean water, and sanitation. Is that really too much to ask? The second issue is that health awareness in the country is absent which has in part led to severe malnutrition and other health threats in the country. Even though Pakistan spends one of the highest share of their income on food, we are marred by undernourishment, wasting, stunting and obesity. They say, nobody goes to bed hungry in
Pakistan, but what food is satiating the hungry? The important end of spectrum is the quality and nutritional value of food that Pakistanis are consuming.
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