Ratio of neonatal, mother and infant mortality falls

District Nowshera posts worst figures for two consecutive quarters

PESHAWAR: With the incumbent PTI government focusing on uplifting the health sector, the ratio for maternal, neonatal and infant mortality (per 1,000 cases) has dropped in the second quarter when compared to the first quarter in 2018.

Reports for the first quarter, from January to March 2018, around 51,008 live births were confirmed across Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P).

During this period, 920 neonatal deaths were recorded with a neonatal death ratio of 18 per cent.



In the subsequent quarter, from April to June 2018, the report stated that 52,058 live births were reported from across the province with 800 neonatal deaths.

“Overall the neonatal mortality rate is 15 per cent,” the report read.

The report further said that in the first quarter, 56,346 deliveries were carried out across the province by skilled medical workers, adding that 106 mothers had died during these deliveries.

Swat district reported some 6,193 deliveries where only two mothers died during childbirth. By contrast, Nowshera district reported 3,073 deliveries with 18 women passing away — the highest figure of deaths across K-P in the first quarter.

“The mortality rate for mothers during pregnancy or deliveries is 188 [for the first quarter] in K-P,” the report stated.

As with the improvement in neonatal mortality rate, an improvement was witnessed in health service deliveries in the second quarter with the report stating that the maternal mortality ratio fell to 138 [per 1,000 deliveries] in K-P with 72 mothers passing away in 51,998 deliveries.

The provincial capital reported the most deliveries in the quarter at 7,611 deliveries with 12 deaths reported during this period.



Nowshera, though, had a higher delivery to death ratio with 2,422 deliveries reported across the district with 13 deaths. According to the district’s report, the infant mortality ratio was reported around 25 per cent [deaths per 1,000 live births].

“Overall provincial infant mortality rate is 25 per cent,” said the report, adding that 1,389 infants had died during the 56,346 deliveries conducted by skilled medical workers across the province in the first quarter of 2018.

The report for the second quarter notes that this ratio fell to just 17 per cent when some 870 infants died in 51,998 deliveries. The report further said that the leading causes of infant mortality at birth were asphyxia, pneumonia, term birth complications, diarrhoea, malaria, measles and malnutrition. 

Published in The Express Tribune, October 6^th, 2018.