‘Race for Survival’: Marathon highlights role of health workers

Report launched at event stressed need of large skilled workforce to curtail child mortality.

ISLAMABAD:

Around 240 children in Pakistan joined the world’s biggest marathon on Wednesday, calling on the government to address the health workers’ crisis to accelerate progress in tackling preventable child deaths.

‘Race for Survival’ involved 50,000 children in 67 countries to mark the Global Day of Action.

The event, organised by Save the Children, was held at the IBEX Club in Lake View Park where 120 students from various schools in the twin cities ran a relay marathon.



The race officially began when Pakistan’s national squash coach Nasir Iqbal and Save the Children Country Director David Skinner led four colour-coded teams and passed the batons on to the children.

“Every hour of every day, 40 children in Pakistan die before celebrating their fifth birthday, one of the highest rates in the world,” Skinner said.

He added that health workers are absolutely essential if we are to end preventable child deaths.

“They are crucial in delivering newborns, giving out routine immunisation, diagnosing and treating common childhood disease and providing nutrition advice to mothers,” he said.

Later a report titled “Lives on the line: an agenda for ending preventable child deaths”, was launched.

The report reveals that the lack of health workers has caused weak routine immunisation and for common childhood illness to go untreated, resulting in consistently high rates of child deaths especially in rural and urban slums.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 24^th, 2013.