Briefly describe the status of child health in a chosen country. Are there any noticeable trends in child health (i.e. under 5 mortality rate has declined in recent years; funding in child health has increased)? Given current data, where do you think the government of your chosen country should invest more resources to improve child health?

Child mortality is the deaths of children or infants and may be differentiated according to the age or period after birth in which the death occurs. According to You, D. (2009) child mortality is considered as the death of a child who is between 0-5 years old. Infant mortality is however considered by the demise of an infant aged between 0-1 years. Neonatal mortality is the demise of infants aged between 0-28 days while perinatal mortality is the death of infants aged 0-7 days which also includes still births. The mortality rates are considered as the deaths per every 1000 births in the specific child/infant age group.

Question one

How do global Child Mortality rates and causes of death help us assess the situation in different countries?

In the fight against Child mortality and its causes requires every bit of information concerning this. The availability of such information from across the globe is considered the first step in waging this battle which is quite an uphill task in many parts of the world. Though the death of children is regrettable, this information does enable relevant concerned bodies such as governments, donors, relief organizations, the United Nations and other interested parties know of the regions requiring assistance and if need be, “persuasion.” According to Bryce et al. (2005) financial assistance is key in this struggle as most, not all, necessary programs aimed at reducing child mortality rates boils down to how much these interested parties are willing to spend on the necessary measures.

There are also diseases and causes of child mortality that also come up from time to time and information regarding deaths brought about by these diseases is necessary as it enables researchers to carry out necessary studies, and find the right preventive measures, and reach out to the most affected of these areas.

These fatalities also enable studies on progress being made to be visible. In the countdown to the 2015 deadline with regard to the MDG-4, the decrease in child mortality rates in some of the regions with the highest mortality rates indicates that significant progress is being made. This subsequently enables information as to what these regions are doing right and this information spread out to the rest of the world.

Question 2

What are some of the challenges in Tracking child survival and collection of accurate data on Child Health?

Head ways that have been made in child survival have sometimes gone unnoticed in various parts of the world. According to Horton et al. (2006), the child agenda has fallen been put on the back burner since it is not high on the political agenda. As such, even the developments that have been made go unnoticed and greatly hamper the collection of relevant information.

Among some of these developing countries, dissemination of information is a problem due to the lack of information infrastructure. Tracking developments that have been made in these regions becomes a problem since records such as health records, census, demographic surveillance or even household surveys are practically non-existent. It is also evident deaths are also less registered than birth and in rural areas death and birth are hardly registered.

Question 3

Briefly describe the Status of Child Health in a chosen country

The Child health situation in Kenya is commendable. Over the years, there have been noticeable strides made in combating child mortality.  According to Mugo et al (2004) there has been formulation of policies such as the National Strategic Health Plan of for the period 1999-2004 which was meant to translate the policies made into implementable programs. This strategy though after revaluation in 2004 indicated that the policy had bared little fruit.

This however lead to the development of the National Health Sector Strategic Plan II (NHSSP II) which according to the Ministry of Health (Revising the Trend, 2005) sought to improve the planning process within the ministry, provide a dialogue platform and further the reform process.

According the World Vision Kenya (Child Health Now Campaign, 2009) noticeable improvements are taking shape. It may be noted that CHN is now actively involved in the process of formulating the National budget while enables the organization of influence the health sectors budgetary allocation.

Campaigns also propagated by world Vision Kenya have also been able to bring together players such as UNICEF and Save the Children in partnership. Currently they are working on a campaign to improve child nutrition in the country.

There has also been activities organized such as, the Kass-Standard corporate marathon that aims at encouraging local and international communities to contribute both financially or otherwise, towards the development of Child health in the country.

Over the past few years, there has also been an increasing realization of training skilled birth attendants. This has been due to the fact that, some of the women giving birth do not have access to the right medical facilities at the time of birth. This therefore creates an opportunity for community birth attendant to offer these services. Training is therefore necessary for these attendants who have to give the primary care during birth. Secondary care his however advised for these mothers to avoid complications in the infants. This has greatly reduced the rate of child mortality.

The Kenyan government, as has been evident in the past budgeting process has made significant improvements in allocating more funds to the health sector. This is however not enough as more needs to be done. More funds, medical practitioners and research needs to be carried out in the country in order to make that much required dent in Child mortality rates.

References

Horton, R. (2006, January). The coming decade for Global action on Child Health.  Retrieved

April 23^rd, 2012, from

http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/issue/vol367no9504/PIIS0140-6736(06)X6173-1

Mugo R. et al (2004). Overview of the Health Sector in Kenya.

The Ministry of Health Kenya. (2005). Revising the Trends. The Second National Health

Sector Plan II 2005-2010.

You, D. (2009, December). Data and Methodology to Estimate Child Mortality (UNICEF).

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