Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'Prevent deaths of newborns' that was published in Newsband

Prevent deaths of newborns                 

Over three lakh newborns in India die on the very first day of their birth. With this the country ranks as number one in terms of first day of birth mortality; its share in global first-day deaths stands at 29 per cent. The next worst performer, Nigeria, is a distant second with less than 90,000 deaths a year and a nine per cent share of global deaths.

India needs to adopt multiple strategies, and with greater immediacy, for a large reduction in the number of newborn deaths. Tremendous gain can be achieved by preventing childhood marriages as teenage pregnancy greatly contributes to first-day deaths.

Poor mothers living in rural areas are another at-risk group that needs undivided focus. If poor health before and during pregnancy is already a big risk factor, lack of good medical care during delivery exacerbates it.

The uncomfortable truth is the questionable quality of care at many of these facilities. The personnel attending to deliveries are very often not properly trained and hence not fully proficient in labour-room protocols. Labour rooms are not always fully equipped with essential medicines, equipment and electricity. All these result in the incongruity between more facilities but poor outcome. There should be women-friendly public services provided by fully equipped health-centres with a well-trained nurse round the clock to ensure safe deliveries.

An effective solution to this plague-like problem is to train women to be effective and efficient mid-wives. This will serve the dual purpose of bringing down the number of first-day deaths and generating jobs for women. Additionally, parents and care-givers must be educated about various essential vaccinations for the new-born. Both the government and the corporate sector can pitch in by organizing prenatal classes for pregnant women and their families. This could be a revolutionary initiative.

Another thing is that not enough financial allocation is being made in the budget provisions. Only a fraction of total outlay of budget is earmarked for the health sector. Administrators and politicians are often busy only in tackling the surface of the problem and getting the maximum publicity/ mileage out of it. Unless politicians and administrators put the country's interest above their self interest and their party's interest, there can be no redemption. Both central and state government need to fight together against this dismal condition.

Well, another sad truth of 'developing' India is female foeticide that takes place in big number. It is really depressing that India's record for Family Welfare and Child Care is at the bottom of the World Rankings. It is time India invested much more Public Health and Child care by bringing proper Medical Facilities in Rural as well as urban areas.

Another factor contributing to these appalling statistics is the lack of proper nutrition, especially for young mothers, women and children. Government should provide incentives to mothers who have given birth to girl children and should also provide financial support to girl children till they achieve certain age.

All these negative happenings in our country are due to the type of governance our country is having. This is reflection of the type of politicians who fight only for enjoying power and amassing wealth and not for the welfare and prosperity of common citizens. There is need for change in our political system. Give tickets only to deserving candidates who are sacrificing for the country and its people and not make people sacrifice for the welfare and prosperity of politicians.