1,384 died in first quarter of 2017 in KP

PESHAWAR: Haripur tops the list of all 25 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in terms of child mortality rate as 173 children died during three months in the area, health authorities said.

According to the figures released by the District Health Information System (DHIS) for first quarter of 2017, 1,384 infants have died of various ailments across the province.

Haripur tops the list and it has reported 173 infant deaths while Hangu, Kohistan and Torghar have not reported any infant death during the period. However, a health official said the child deaths may not have been reported to health facilities in the three districts.

Of other districts, 138 infant deaths were reported in Abbottabad, 113 in Swabi, 52 in Kohat, 147 in Mansehra, 41 in Buner, 25 in Tank, 32 in Karak, 18 in Lakki Marwat, 42 in Dera Ismail Khan, 17 in Shangla, 110 in Mardan, 124 in Swat, 72 in Charsadda, 58 in Nowshera, 35 in Bannu, 119 in Peshawar, 24 in Chitral, 8 each in Upper Dir and Lower Dir, 24 in Malakand and 4 in Battagram.

Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (MNCH) project coordinator for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Dr Sahib Gul said that one of the major causes behind infant deaths was low birth weight.

“Neonatal mortality rate is 35 percent in Pakistan,” he said. Neonatal period is the time from birth till the age of 12 days.

However, he claimed that the neonatal mortality rate is 32 percent in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa because of MNCH services.

“MNCH programme is the lone project in our province and it does not exist in any other province of the country,” he said.

He added that the programme has increased the number of skilled birth attendants and also raised awareness among people to use hospital services for maternity and child care.

“Under MNCH programme, expected mothers are given Rs300 plus free medicine at hospitals during their four antenatal visits, Rs1000 on birth of a child and Rs700 during each post-natal visit,” he added.

Meanwhile, the DHIS data says that 144,338 children were fully immunised in all districts of the province.

Full immunisation means that a child under two years of age is administered all doses of BCG vaccines, three doses of polio and pentavalent vaccines and two doses of measles vaccine in a given year.

Swat tops the list of all KP districts with 1,66,47 children immunized during the period while Kohistan is at the bottom with 393 immunised children.