Child Death

From VOA Learning English,

this is the Health Report.

The United Nations Children's Fund

is praising Ethiopia for reaching one of

the Millennium Development Goals on child survival.

UNICEF officials say Ethiopia has reduced

its number of child death by more than two-thirds.

Between 1990 and 2012,

the country reported a 67 percent drop

in the number of children dying

before the age of five.

Ethiopia's Minister of Health Kesetebirhan Admasu

welcomed the good news,

but he admitted that even with the improvement

Ethiopia is considered a high-mortality country.

"If you look at the absolute number of children dying in Ethiopia,

it is still huge.

We have committed to end all preventive child deaths

in a generation by 2035.

And we have developed a roadmap to reach that ambitious target."

Diarrhea, pneumonia and malaria are the leading causes of death

among young children in Ethiopia.

In 1990, the country's death rate for children under five

was one of the highest in the world,

it was 204 death for every 1,000 births.

The rate is now at 68 per 1,000,

this means that hundreds of thousands of Ethiopian children

who might have died in earlier years

now reach their fifth birthday.

Ethiopia is one of four African countries

to have reached a Millennium Development Goal,

the other three are Liberia, Malawi and Tanzania.

One of the reasons for Ethiopia's success

is its Health Extension Program,

because of it,

38,000 people were employed to bring health care services

to a large part of the rural population.

Peter Salama is UNICEF representative to Ethiopia.

He says Ethiopia's plan of action

can serve as an example for other countries:

"Several other African countries have come to do study tours,

including delegations from Togo, Guinea, Namibia

- all came to study the health extension program

and see how they can replicate this critical lesson of

bringing health care to the doorstep of the rural population."

The United Nations first announced

the Millennium Development Goals 13 years ago,

the goals remain to help countries pay more attention

to issues such as fighting extreme poverty.

Progress on the Millennium Development Goal of

reducing child death is slow in most countries,

only 13 of 61 countries are in a position to meet the goal.

And that's the Health Report from VOA Learning English.