Study finds big decrease in global child mortality

[cory777]

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - Fewer children are dying around the world, with deaths among children under 5 falling in almost every country, U.S. researchers reported on Sunday.

Using a new method of calculating mortality that they say is more complete and accurate than previous methods, the team at the University of Washington says the number of deaths of children under 5 has plummeted from 11.9 million in 1990 to 7.7 million in 2010.

The findings are similar to a September report by the United Nation's children's fund that showed better malaria prevention and using drugs to protect newborns of AIDS-infected mothers lowered mortality from 12.5 million under-five deaths in 1990 to 8.8 million in 2008.

But the new estimates suggest that 800,000 fewer young children died than UNICEF estimates.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64N0PM20100524

[Quantess]

1. This is good news, but only if the birth rate decreases as well.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. The rate of births per existing population is decreasing

See eg http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=xx&v=25 - down from around 22 per 1,000 population in 2000 to about 20.

However, the world population also went up in that time, so the absolute number of births continued to increase. Going from the US Census Bureau figures for the world, we get the absolute number of births per year as:

2001: 129,840,545
2009: 131,645,076
2013: 132,715,801 (the year they estimate the peak will be in)
2020: 131,478,836

http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/region.php