'400,000 children die in Pakistan every year'

KARACHI: Dr Ahson Rabbani, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), ChildLife Foundation aimed to further extend the mission of the ChildLife Foundation which is 'Saving the Future of Pakistan' through facilitating rapid access to quality urgent medical care and intervening by establishing cost-effective preventive measures.

Dr Ahson Rabbani while speaking to Medical News Pakistan said, “Pakistan’s largest mortality is that of children under five years of age. Approximately 400,000 children die every year, though 50% of these deaths are preventable if the emergency rooms of our hospitals are fully functional.”

“Keeping this in mind, the ChildLife Foundation has transformed the pediatric emergency rooms of all government teaching hospitals in Sindh and Baluchistan,” said Dr Ahson urged.

These include the children emergency rooms in the Dr Ruth KM Pfau Civil Hospital, Karachi, National Institute of Child Health, Karachi, Sindh Government Hospital Korangi-5, Lyari General Hospital, Karachi, Abbasi Shaheed Hospital, Karachi, People Medical College, Nawabshah, Chandka Medical College, Larkana, Ghulam Muhammad Mahar Medical College, Sukkur, Liaquat University of Medical & Health Sciences, Hyderabad, and Civil Hospital, Quetta, Rabbani added.

Three million children have been treated till now, and with the up-gradation of the remaining Emergency Rooms (ERs), one million children will be treated every year, he added. The survival of critically ill children has been quadrupled, noted Dr Rabbani.

Dr Ahson said “Our vision is to transform all 40+ pediatric emergency rooms in the government teaching hospitals of Pakistan. Tele-medicine satellite centers will also be established in government hospitals across all tehsils.”

Dr Rabbani shared with Medical News Paksitan that in addition to all the ChildLife ERs in Sindh and Baluchistan, telemedicine sites were only operational at the Sindh Government Hospital in New Karachi, the District Headquarter Hospital in Mithi, the Syed Abdullah Shah Institute of Medical Sciences in Sehwan, and the Civil Hospital in Ghotki, as per Ahson. He further stated that no child in Karachi was more than 30 minutes away from accessing a world-class emergency room set up by the ChildLife Foundation in five government hospitals of Karachi.

It is pertinent to mention here that based on the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals, all countries in the world are aiming to reduce neonatal mortality to as low as 12 per 1000 live births and the under-5 mortality to as low as 25 per 1000 live births by 2030 and we are working to achieve that goal.

-MN Report