Report Says Pakistan Has Highest Rate Of Death For Newborns

A new Save the Children report has called child mortality "one of the great shames of our modern world." (file photo)

Pakistan has the highest rate of death for newborn babies, according to a new report by the international NGO Save the Children.

Pakistan's rate of first-day deaths and stillbirths was 40.7 per 1,000 births in 2012, followed by Nigeria (32.7), Sierra Leone (30.8), Somalia (29.7), Guinea-Bissau (29.4), and Afghanistan (29.0).

It said that fewer than half of women in Pakistan had a skilled health worker present at birth.

The report concludes that 1 million newborns die within their first 24 hours of life each year and that 6.6 million children around the world die before the fifth birthdays, mostly from preventable causes.

The aid organization called child mortality "one of the great shames of our modern world" and urged world leaders, philanthropists, and the private sector to commit to ending preventable newborn deaths.


With reporting by AFP