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Al Mayadeen's correspondent: Two were martyred in an initial toll of the Israeli drone strike that targeted the al-Asira neighborhood in the city of Baalbek, eastern Lebanon
Al Mayadeen's correspondent: An Israeli drone strike targeted the al-Asira neighborhood east of Baalbek, eastern Lebanon
Sheikh Naim Qassem to the pager attack survivors: You are the greatest resistance. Know that 'Israel' will fall because it embodies aggression, crime, and occupation; victory is truly yours
Sheikh Qassem to the pager attack survivors: The value of what you are doing despite your wounds is immense, and here you are, treading the path of the Master of Nation's Martyrs and the leaders
Sheikh Qassem to the pager attack survivors: You are moving forward with insight deeper than sight itself. The enemy sought to eliminate your role in the battle, yet you remain steadfast and continue the fight
Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem to the pager attack survivors one year later: You are healing from your wounds and rising above them. You have successfully passed the test
Palestinian media: Reports of stabbing operation in occupied al-Quds.
Israeli media: Sirens blare in Arava in South, near Ramon Airport.
Egyptian PM Mostafa Madbouli: Egypt is targeted in plans to redraw regional map
AEOI Chief Mohammad Eslami: Our presence in IAEA General Council and fact-checking helped in preventing unilateral rhetoric that aims to portray Iran as an unregulated country

Doctors say simple measures could save 1 million babies a year

  • By Al Mayadeen English
  • Source: News websites
  • 9 May 2023 11:17
3 Min Read

New research says the developing world's 'silent health disaster' may be averted by spending less than £1 billion to make routine prenatal care available to everybody.

  • x
  • Doctors say simple measures could save 1 million babies a year
    Medical staff attends to a baby with covid-19 at the Wuhan Children's Hospital in Wuhan China on March 6, 2020. (Reuters)

According to a recent study, moms might save the lives of over a million newborns each year if they had access to simple, low-cost health measures such as vitamins, antimalarials, and aspirin.

The report, which focuses on the "silent public health disaster" of newborns delivered "too small or too soon," comes as the United Nations cautions that progress in decreasing neonatal deaths and stillbirths has stalled since 2015, with inadequate, underfunded prenatal care playing a role.

The study's authors predict that if a handful of mostly prenatal interventions were completely adopted in 81 low- and middle-income countries, 476,000 infant deaths and 566,000 stillbirths may be averted each year.

Read more: Smokeless tobacco during pregnancy linked to risk of cot death

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Between 1990 and 2020, the number of neonatal mortality decreased by more than half globally, from 5 million to 2.4 million. However, the numbers remain high in the developing world, notably in Sub-Saharan Africa and southern Asia.

According to a UN report released this week, the rate of progress has slowed since 2015 due to decreased investment, with each year since bringing more than 2 million newborn deaths and 1.9 million stillbirths (babies who die after 28 weeks of pregnancy, as defined by the World Health Organization).

Anshu Banerjee, the WHO’s director of maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health and aging divulged that things must be done differently if different results are hoped for. “More and smarter investments in primary healthcare are needed now so that every woman and baby, no matter where they live, has the best chance of health and survival.”

The estimated cost of rolling out the measures across the 81 countries in question would be about $1.1bn (£870m), the authors say, an amount described by one as “a fraction” of what other health programs receive. Yet the impact could be huge, they argue, potentially preventing 5.2 million babies a year from being born either pre-term, small for gestational age or with low birth weight (defined as less than 5.5lb).

 The authors, a group of experts with expertise in many aspects of child and maternal health, invent a new word for these babies: tiny vulnerable newborns, or SVNs. They estimate that one in every four (35.3 million) kids born alive in 2020 would have matched the SVN criterion.

  • Vitamins
  • babies
  • Healthcare
  • prenatal care
  • maternity

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