India has the highest number of pneumonia and diarrhoea deaths among children in the world with nearly 3 lakh children dying in 2016, a new report released ahead of World Pneumonia Day on November 12 said.
The Pneumonia and Diarrhoea Progress Report for 2016 which was released by International Vaccine Access Centre(IVAC), Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said that the top five countries with highest global burden of child pneumonia and diarrhoea deaths are India, Nigeria, Pakistan, Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola.
"The top 15 countries contributing to the global burden of child pneumonia and diarrhoea deaths were unchanged between 2015 and 2016. These 15 highest burden countries consist of India, Nigeria, Pakistan, DRC, Angola, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Chad, Afghanistan, Niger, China, Sudan, Bangladesh, Somalia, and United Republic of Tanzania," it said.
The report said that only six of the highest-burden countries (Angola, Ethiopia, India, Niger, Sudan and Tanzania) have introduced rotavirus vaccines in their routine immunisation program to help prevent a substantial portion of diarrhoea deaths and hospitalisation.
India introduced rotavirus vaccines in four states in 2015, it said.
"Fifteen years after pneumococcal conjugate vaccines' (PCV) first introduction globally in 2000 (the United States was first to implement the vaccine), five of the highest pneumonia burden countries (India, Indonesia, Chad, China and Somalia) are still not using the vaccine in their routine immunisation programs," the report said.
The Health Ministry recently announced that the PCV that can combat pneumonia, will be rolled out as part of the Universal Immunisation Programme, in a phased manner in Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.
The report found that some progress has been made in combating pneumonia and diarrhoea among young children in the nations most severely impacted by the two diseases, but they remain responsible for hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths around the world.
In 2015, pneumonia and diarrhoea together led to one of every four deaths globally that occurred in children under five years old.
(REOPENS DEL 106)
IVAC identifies the 15 countries with the greatest number of deaths from pneumonia and diarrhoea among children under the age of five in a given year.
IVAC then uses a scoring method based on the Global Action Plan for the Prevention of Pneumonia and Diarrhoea (GAPPD) developed by the World Health Organization and UNICEF.
A country's "GAPPD score" measures the use of interventions that protect against, prevent and treat pneumonia and diarrhoea. The higher the score, the more interventions are being used.
"Overall GAPPD scores in 2016 varied widely from a low of 20 per cent (Somalia) to a high of 74 per cent (Tanzania), with all 15 countries falling below the 86 per cent target for the overall GAPPD score.
"Over the past year, some large countries, including Nigeria, DRC, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and China had little to no improvement in their GAPPD scores, while others, including India, Angola, Niger, and Bangladesh have made substantial gains," the report said.
"Pneumonia and diarrhoea fly under the radar. These illnesses are so common that many people and organizations fail to recognize the need to step up efforts and identify creative solutions to fight them.
"Although most cases are easily prevented and treated, they often prove deadly when families cannot access basic health services such as vaccines and antibiotic treatment," said Kate O'Brien, professor in the Bloomberg School's Department of International Health and IVAC's executive director.
