Sierra Leone ranks first in child mortality

From the Associated Press story by Eliane Engeler:

A new UN report says a newborn in Sierra Leone has the lowest chance in the world of surviving until age five.

The fund says that in 2006 – the most recent year for which statistics are available – more than 26,000 children around the world died each day before reaching their fifth birthday.

Most of the 9.7 million deaths were from preventable causes such as diarrhea, malaria or malnutrition.

Sierra Leone had the highest child mortality rate, with 270 deaths per 1,000 births. Angola was second with 260 deaths, followed by Afghanistan with 257.

The rate worldwide in 2006, was 72 deaths per 1,000 births. The average rate in industrialized countries was six deaths per 1,000 births.

Sub-Saharan Africa, too, has its bright spots. Mozambique, for example, has seen a 41 per cent drop in child mortality after the government and aid agencies trained community educators to teach the country's rural population about cheap health practices, such as breast-feeding, oral rehydration therapy and mosquito nets.