The proportion of children in the country's population has fallen to an all-time low of 13.5 per cent. That's a demographic catastrophe that is without precedent in the developed world, writes BLAINE HARDEN Japan celebrated a national holiday, last Monday, in honour of its children. But Children's Day might just as easily have been a national day of mourning. For this is the land of disappearing children and a slow-motion demographic catastrophe that is without precedent in the developed world.
THE efforts of a Geneva-based organisation called Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) to set up an infant and young child nutrition (IYCN) alliance in India have raised the hackles of groups involved in the promotion of breastfeeding and child and infant survival.
According to the latest global report card, India ranks 27th along with Ghana and Eritrea when it comes to providing basic healthcare to its children, which includes life-saving interventions like prenatal care, skilled childbirth, immunization and treatment for diarrhoea and pneumonia. Over 53% children in India under five years
Alarmed over the spurt in child mortality cases in Mizoram over the past one year, the State Government has initiated steps to provide better healthcare facilities to the people in remote areas of the State. At least 608 children died during 2007-08 as compared to 258 during the previous year posing serious concern to the authorities, Director of State Health and Family Welfare Department Dr N Pallai said. Pallai told PTI that the department was yet to fathom the cause of rise in child deaths and there was no report of any epidemic-like situation anywhere in the State.
Let's hear it for Tanzania. Despite being one of the world's poorest nations, it has become a role model in how to reach global targets for reducing death rates of children and mothers - putting most of its poor African neighbours to shame. So says the World Health Organization.
India is failing its women and children and is crawling towards the Millennium Development Goal (MDG), which targets to cut child death rates by twothirds and maternal mortality by three-quarters between 1990-2015. According to a report that tracks the progress made by 68 priority countries, which account for 97% of maternal and child deaths worldwide, only 16 (24%) were on track to meet the MDG compared to 7 of 60 (12%) in 2005. India, however, is not one of them.
A recent national survey in Tanzania reported that mortality in children younger than 5 years dropped by 24% over the 5 years between 2000 and 2004. The researchers aimed to investigate yearly changes to identify what might have contributed to this reduction and to investigate the prospects for meeting the Millennium Development Goal for child survival (MDG 4).
The Countdown to 2015 for Maternal, Newborn, and Child Survival initiative monitors coverage of priority interventions to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) for reduction of maternal and child mortality. We aimed to report on 68 countries which have 97% of maternal and child deaths worldwide, and on 22 interventions that have been proven to improve maternal, newborn, and child survival.
In 1947 when India got freedom from the alien British rulers the population of the country was much less than 30 crores and the agricultural production of the grains was only 3 crore metric tones, qui
