PRESIDENT KIKWETE IN CANADA
OpEd: Canada must continue to lead on maternal health
A newborn baby is prepped and handed to the mother moments after delivery inside a birthing room at Nazareth House on May 10, 2013 in Manila, Philippines. The Nazareth home take in women who are expecting mothers and have no capacity to raise a child due to varied socio-economic reasons.
Some of the world’s top leaders will converge on Toronto this week to discuss a global development goal that would have seemed unreachable even a few years ago: ending preventable deaths of mothers, newborns and children within this generation.
Participants at the Saving Every Woman Every Child global summit, which begins Wednesday, include Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-Moon, Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete and Melinda Gates, Co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Summit participants are meeting at a pivotal moment in the history of maternal, newborn and child health. Tremendous progress has been realized over the past few years, but the landmark Muskoka Initiative that catalyzed this momentum is now entering its fifth and last year.
Courtesy the Canadian Network for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health
In 2010, the government of Canada rallied the world around child and maternal health and the Muskoka Initiative was forged. The Muskoka Initiative was an accelerated global commitment towards the achievement of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals to reduce child mortality and improve maternal health. Because of this leadership, more lives are being saved. In 2012, 400,000 fewer children died than in 2010. And this year, more than 250,000 more women will live through pregnancy and childbirth than five years ago.
Yet our work is far from over. Canadians want to see this job through to the end.
Too many women are still dying in childbirth, and too many children are still dying in their first years of life. Every year, 289,000 women still die due to complications during pregnancy and childbirth. And 6.6 million children will die before their fifth birthday from preventable causes like malnutrition, diarrhoea or pneumonia, especially newborns in their first month of life.
Preventable diseases are still leading to the deaths of mothers, newborns and children who are marginalized because they live in remote areas and fragile states, are orphaned or are part of ethnic minorities.
Canadian projects are making a real difference. For instance in 2013, Canada’s Micronutrient Initiative helped ensure 146 million children were reached with two doses of vitamin A and Plan Canada trained more than 63,000 health workers in maternal, newborn and child health.
We know what has to be done: we must accelerate our efforts and scale up cost-effective, proven solutions, to reach the poorest and most vulnerable women and children. If this global momentum can be harnessed, and we mobilize new commitments and resources, ending preventable deaths within this generation is within our reach.
That is why the Canadian Network for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (CAN-MNCH) is calling for a renewed Canadian and global commitment.
Our call to action includes:
- A commitment by global leaders to ensure that ending preventable maternal, newborn and child deaths is a central priority of the global agenda
- A revitalized Canadian commitment announcement of renewed resources of $3.25 billion from 2015 to 2020, including $400 million additional investment.
Over the coming days, we will be hearing a lot about the hope for the future and the progress that we have achieved to help the world’s mothers and their children. Canadian ingenuity and perseverance is leading this effort. We are in the final push to end preventable deaths within a generation.
Dorothy Shaw is Chair of the Canadian Network for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (CAN-MNCH)Vice President, Medical Affairs, BC Women’s Hospital and Health Centre
http://ottawacitizen.com/news/world/oped-canada-must-continue-to-lead-on-maternal-health
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