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Death rate for Afghan kids drops

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  • Death rate for Afghan kids drops

    KABUL, Afghanistan - Six years after the Taliban's ouster, medical care in Afghanistan has improved such that nearly 90,000 children who would have died before age 5 in 2001 will survive this year, Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Sunday.

    Saddled for years with one of the world's worst records on child health, Afghanistan has seen access to health care rise dramatically since the U.S.-led invasion.

    Thousands of health clinics have been built across the country, and the Afghan government and aid agencies have trained tens of thousands of doctors, vaccinators and health volunteers who now reach into some of the country's most remote areas.

    Access to health care for Afghans has jumped from 8 percent of the population in the 1990s to close to 85 percent today, thanks in large part to efforts by USAID, the World Bank and the European Commission.

    The under-5 child mortality rate in Afghanistan has declined from an estimated 257 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2001 to about 191 per 1,000 in 2006, a 25-percent drop, the Ministry of Public Health said, relying on a new study from Johns Hopkins University.

    "This is certainly very positive news," said the U.N. spokesman in Afghanistan, Adrian Edwards. "To come from such low life expectancy to see this improvement does appear to be an indication that the work on the health sector here is beginning to pay off."

    President Hamid Karzai, surrounded by smiling Afghan children at a news conference in Kabul, thanked aid organizations and health workers for their work. He said 89,000 children will be saved each year because of the improved health care.

    Still, Afghanistan faces severe problems. Even with the improvements, almost one in five Afghan children will die before age 5, translating into 250,000 childhood deaths a year, mostly from malnutrition, diarrhea, tuberculosis and malaria, said Health Minister Mohammad Amin Fatimi.

    Childhood immunizations have risen dramatically, but Afghan infants make up the bulk of the country's high child mortality rate, said Tariq Ihsan of Save the Children.

    "Many newborns are dying because they don't have access to immediate health care. I think that's a real challenge for Afghanistan. They need to ask, 'Are we saving enough newborns?'" Ihsan said.

    Still, deaths of Afghan children who don't reach their first birthday have dropped from 165 per 1,000 in 2001 to 129 per 1,000 today, a drop of some 22 percent, Edwards said.

    Afghanistan's child mortality rate, from birth to age 5, has been among the world's worst. Before recent improvements, only Sierra Leone, with 283 child deaths per 1,000 live births, Angola with 260 and Niger at 259 ranked below Afghanistan's 257, UNICEF said in a 2006 report.

    By comparison, the United States has eight under-5 child deaths per 1,000 births. Singapore and Iceland, with three childhood deaths per 1,000, topped the rankings.

    USAID has spent $309 million since 2002 to improve health services in 13 of Afghanistan's northern provinces, said Julie Fossler, a spokeswoman for USAID.

    More than 670 clinics have been constructed and 10,000 health care workers trained there, and more than 7 million children have been vaccinated for polio, according to USAID information.

    The UNICEF report noted that, like Afghanistan, most of the countries with the worst child mortality rates have suffered from armed conflict.

    By JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press Writer
    Hm, isn't that interesting. Look what happens when you allow a country to bring itself up from the 8th Century into the 21st Century. Still a lot of work to be done though.

    But hey, remember kids: There isn't any progress being made in Afghanistan and the United States is nothing but a bunch of warmongering butchers who can't be bothered to lift a finger to help other countries. They only know how to kill and destroy.
    “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

  • #2
    Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
    Hm, isn't that interesting. Look what happens when you allow a country to bring itself up from the 8th Century into the 21st Century. Still a lot of work to be done though.

    But hey, remember kids: There isn't any progress being made in Afghanistan and the United States is nothing but a bunch of warmongering butchers who can't be bothered to lift a finger to help other countries. They only know how to kill and destroy.
    Please do not use facts in your arguments. They wreak havoc on emotional issues and make liberals very uncomfortable about the bubble of propaganda they have surrounded themselves with.
    "Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

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    • #3
      Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
      Hm, isn't that interesting. Look what happens when you allow a country to bring itself up from the 8th Century into the 21st Century. Still a lot of work to be done though.

      But hey, remember kids: There isn't any progress being made in Afghanistan and the United States is nothing but a bunch of warmongering butchers who can't be bothered to lift a finger to help other countries. They only know how to kill and destroy.
      Have you been reading some of the leftie loonie sites I've been trawling:))
      In the realm of spirit, seek clarity; in the material world, seek utility.

      Leibniz

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      • #4
        All I can say is jolly good!

        That's the sort of news we need coming out of Afghanistan imo.

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        • #5
          Originally posted by VarSity View Post
          jolly good!
          Unusual and nice to hear this turn of phrase, even though I live in England. :D
          HD Ready?

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          • #6
            Originally posted by gunnut View Post
            Please do not use facts in your arguments. They wreak havoc on emotional issues and make liberals very uncomfortable about the bubble of propaganda they have surrounded themselves with.
            They could sue for emotional distress.

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            • #7
              Originally posted by Feanor View Post
              They could sue for emotional distress.
              Oooh that's a good one.
              "Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

              Comment


              • #8
                If there is any country in the world that US should help it is Afghanistan.

                Others dont deserve a dollar.

                I hope this time US doesnt leave before the job is completed so that neighbouring vultures can once again use Afghanistan as a test bed and breeding ground for their crooked games.

                Always notice the masterminds never tie the suicide belt around themselves but make some other less cunning or brainwashed ones do the job.Its always the other sucker who dies for the ideology.

                Good to see NATO toops working hard to rebuild schools etc(many of which the Taliban destroyed as soon as they were constructed)
                God is a cruise missile.

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                • #9
                  Originally posted by FullTank View Post
                  Always notice the masterminds never tie the suicide belt around themselves but make some other less cunning or brainwashed ones do the job.Its always the other sucker who dies for the ideology.
                  Isn't it funny that those who strap on the belt never noticed this trend?

                  Originally posted by FullTank View Post
                  Good to see NATO toops working hard to rebuild schools etc(many of which the Taliban destroyed as soon as they were constructed)
                  We've been doing that in Iraq for the last 4 years. Unfortunately Abu Graibh type stories and outrageous statements like the one from Murtha make the headlines more often.
                  "Only Nixon can go to China." -- Old Vulcan proverb.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by gunnut View Post
                    We've been doing that in Iraq for the last 4 years. Unfortunately Abu Graibh type stories and outrageous statements like the one from Murtha make the headlines more often.
                    Its will be harder to get such a good story out of Iraq, they did have a good healthcare system before we even went in there. Hell my local GP is an Iraqi, born raised and trained.

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                    • #11
                      There are two types who will not be impressed with this news. The first type have been dealt to an extent in this thread. The second type couldn't care less about such small worldly issues. For them every next dead American soldier is one more passport to their private brothel.

                      They will be happy to see that happen even at the cost of continued misery of their fellow co-religionalists. So they would want the USA to remain mired in Afghanistan and Iraq even though they may profess to care for the people in these countries.
                      There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don’t..

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