Published 4 November 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b4548
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b4548

News

Action plan aims to prevent 5.3 million children dying from pneumonia by 2015

John Zarocostas

1 Geneva

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Only half (54%) of children in developing countries who get pneumonia see a qualified health worker, and less than a fifth (19%) are treated with antibiotics, a new report claims.

An action plan developed jointly by the World Health Organization and Unicef, which produced the report, has identified a package of interventions that the organisations say would prevent most deaths from pneumonia among children if they were implemented on a broad scale and reached the most vulnerable groups.

Ann Veneman, executive director of Unicef, said that pneumonia is the biggest killer of children aged under 5 years, with about 1.8 million deaths each year. She said that interventions to reduce deaths from pneumonia "must be used more widely and made more readily available for children at risk."

The action plan involves managing cases of pneumonia in the community and at health facilities where necessary, stepping up vaccination, improving nutrition, promoting . . . [Full text of this article]


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