Study: Pneumonia killed more than 14 children every hour in India in 2018
Munawar Zaman
Press TV, New Delhi
In India children are revered as the sight of God but their future continues to at stake as hundreds of thousands lose their lives before reaching the age of five.
A collective study conducted by save the children, UNICEF and the Every Breath Counts Coalition has found that every hour 14 children died in India in 2018 due to pneumonia with malnutrition and pollution as two major contributors.
Based on the report five countries responsible for more than half of child pneumonia deaths are Nigeria, India, Pakistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Ethiopia. India was second on the list with 127,000 deaths last year. Pneumonia which is caused by bacteria, viruses or fungi is preventable but in India it leaves children fighting for breath. According to this study Pneumonia emerged as the world’s leading infectious killer of children, claiming the lives of more than 800,000 children under the age of five every year which is more than 2,000 a day.
Based on the latest report by the Lancet Countdown on health and climate change, the issue of climate change is also turning to be a silent child killer. The report said with rising temperatures children born in India will be particularly vulnerable to a greater health burden of malnutrition, air pollution and deadly heat waves.
The Indian government has launched many initiatives and programs to address a range of diseases and risk factors over the past two decades but experts say more intervention are required given the large population of under-five children in the country.
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