A report out today by Save The Children says the rate of child deaths remains high with around 40million women across the world "giving birth without assistance from a skilled healthcare attendant" with figures still high in Sierra Leone.
The report says this leads to the loss of the lives of "millions of infants [whose] lives are lost due to complications that are easily preventable".
It puts Pakistan as having the highest infant mortality rate, with over 40 in every 1,000 babies delivered stillborn or dying within a day of their birth.
The report says Sierra Leone “showed very high infant mortality rates with 31 in 1,000 babies being stillborn due to complications during labour". It however adds: “this is not to say that significant progress has not been made”.
Save The Children says that since the introduction in the last three years of a free health care for pregnant women, breast-feeding mothers and children less than five years old, “the country has taken significant steps to addressing this”.
It says 1.2 million babies are stillborn due to complications during labour with some of the causes including “infections caused by poorly sanitised conditions, or when the baby temporarily stops breathing, something which could be reversed by a healthcare worker trained in resuscitation."
Other causes include obstructed labour which the report says could be prevented if a trained birth attendant was present and able to assist with labour.
Figures show that over half of all women in Sub-Saharan Africa give birth without a skilled birth attendant with Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Guinea-Bissau, DRC, Lesotho, Angola and Ethiopia among the worst affected countries.
(C) 25 February 2014
