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Tag: Child Mortality

 

“Better Than Average” Is Not Good Enough: Accelerating Child Survival in India

2/14/13
Victoria Fan

Last week, the Government of India held a star-studded National Summit on child survival, “co-convened”* with USAID and UNICEF. The high-profile meeting featured politicians (the Minister of Health & Family Welfare, the US Ambassador to India), heavy-hitters in global child health (Bob Black, Zulfiqar Bhutta, Mickey Chopra, Geeta Rao Gupta) along with some Indian stars of child health (Vinod Paul, Abhay Bang, Yogesh Jain), and even a Bollywood actress/“child rights activist” Nandana Sen (daughter of Nobel Laureate and Professor Amartya Sen), to name a few.

What’s New in the Child Survival Call to Action?

9/14/12
Victoria Fan

The newly released new child mortality data by UNICEF has findings that are encouraging yet still worrisome: the world has made progress in reducing child deaths globally; yet each day some 19,000 children die every day largely from preventable causes. USAID highlighted this new publication to remind the world of its “Child Survival Call to Action: Ending Preventable Child Deaths,” co-hosted by USAID, India, Ethiopia, and others on June 14 and 15. Before we completely forget what happened in mid-June, we revisit the event and its desired goals by taking a closer look at the event’s “Roadmap”. Bottom line: The Child Survival Call to Action does not bring much new money or knowledge, but it brings some laudable political attention and a promising emphasis on delivery and accountability. But without more systematic attention from countries and donors, the new child survival agenda risks being another same-old global-health flavor-of-the-month, potentially crowded out by competing priorities in global health.

Will the Agenda for Child Survival Survive?

6/19/12
Victoria Fan

Saving kids: Who doesn’t want to do that? Though relatively uncontroversial (say, compared to saving drug addicts and sex workers), the agenda for child survival is not new. In fact, it’s a (relatively) old agenda in global health, arguably dating back to the time of UNICEF's third Executive Director James Grant (1980-1995) who pushed to recognize the “global silent emergency” and to reduce preventable child deaths.

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