Child deaths from pneumonia is said to have reduced significantly according to UNICEF.
As the world celebrated the fifth World Pneumonia Day on November 12, UNICEF says significant decline in child deaths from pneumonia has proven that strategies to defeat the disease were working.
However, the organisation says more was needed to stop hundreds of thousands of children from succumbing to this preventable illness each year.
Statistics
In 2013, for the first time in over a decade, pneumonia was not the leading cause of death among children under five, coming second after pre-term birth complications, according to figures released recently by UNICEF.
Although the pneumonia toll was still high – accounting for 15 per cent of deaths, or 954,000 children per year, deaths from the disease have declined by 44 per cent since 2000.
“Pneumonia is still a very dangerous disease – it kills more children under five than HIV and AIDS, malaria, injuries and measles combined – and though the numbers are declining, with nearly one million deaths a year, there is no room for complacency,” said Dr Mickey Chopra, head of UNICEF’s global health programmes.
“Poverty is the biggest risk factor, and that means our efforts need to reach every child, no matter how marginalised,” he added.
Causes of pneumonia
Deaths from pneumonia are highest in poor rural communities. Household air pollution is a major cause of pneumonia, so children from households which rely on solid fuels such as wood, dung or charcoal for cooking or heating, are at high risk. Overcrowded homes also contribute to higher pneumonia levels. In addition, poor children are less likely to be immunised against measles and whooping cough, which are also among major causes of the disease.
Early diagnosis and treatment of pneumonia and access to health care will save lives thus strategies must target low income communities.
The increased use of pneumonia vaccines, particularly in low income countries has led to progress against the disease, but inequities exist even in countries with wide coverage.
“Closing the treatment gap between the poor and the better off is crucial to bringing down preventable deaths from pneumonia,” Dr Chopra said.
“The more we focus on the causes and the known solutions, the faster we will bring this childhood scourge under control.”
UNICEF’s contribution
UNICEF’s supply division has today put out a call to innovators for new, improved and more easily affordable respiratory rate timers to aid in the timely recognition and management of pneumonia.
One simple treatment has had great success: trained community health workers give sick children the antibiotic amoxicillin in a child-friendly tablet form as part of an integrated case management programme at the community level. Scaling up the availability of similar inexpensive medicines will help to reduce the treatment gap, especially among hard to reach populations.
Simple measures such as early and exclusive breastfeeding; handwashing with soap; vaccination; and provision of micronutrients will also reduce the incidence of pneumonia.
