Zambia is a society with high levels of poverty in which children and women face many health risks. For children, these include vaccine preventable diseases (e.g. tuberculosis, polio, measles, diphtheria, whooping cough and tetanus), HIV, malaria, pneumonia,diarrhoea and malnutrition.
“Malnutrition continues to be an underlying cause of child deaths”
Between 2007 and 2018, Zambia has seen a 50 per cent reduction in maternal and under 5 mortality, and a 40 per cent reduction in infant mortality. However, in the period 2014-2018, neonatal mortality rates increased from 24 to 27deaths per 1,000 births. Inadequate infrastructure,access to services and quality of care are the key factors hindering stronger progress for the health of womenand children. Despite improvements, neonatal and maternal mortality rates remain high for a low-middle income country like Zambia.
Malnutritioncontinues to be an underlying cause of children’s deaths with little change to stunting levels in the last few decades. Zambia’s general population has an estimated HIVprevalence of 11.1per cent, with women carrying a higher burden at 14.2per cent. Health issues are worse in rural areas and among the poor.
