Mother and Child Week

Providing Health Facilities at Door Step

Each year Pakistan witnesses preventable deaths of 432,000 children under-five and 20,000 mothers due to causes related to pregnancy and child birth. Among the under-five deaths, two-thirds are in the newborn period (first 28 days of life) and the remaining are largely due to pneumonia (13%) and diarrhoea (11%). Diarrhoea is a seasonal calamity (number of cases start rising in April and peak around July & August each year). About 70,000 children in Pakistan die due to diarrhoea, every year. Most of these precious lives can be saved by simple knowledge about prevention and promotion of some key measures at home and health care seeking practices.

To address the above issues by raising awareness and strengthening the health system to become more responsive, National Programme for Family Planning and Primary Health Care, Ministry of Health in collaboration with UNICEF has initiated celebration Mother & Child Week, since 2007 on biannual basis., 1^st week in April and other in October focusing 02 major killer diseases of children, diarrhoea and pneumonia.

In 1^st round of November 2007, activity was piloted only in 03 districts of Punjab. The initiative was scaled up with UNICEF support to six districts ( 3 in Punjab, 1 each in NWFP, Sindh and Baluchistan) in months of April and October, 2008. It was called “Child Health & Sanitation Week” to acknowledge the impact of hygiene and sanitation practices on incidence of pneumonia and diarrhea. In April round of 2009, 29 districts of the country were involved (09 in Punjab, 11 in Sindh, 03 in Balochistan, 04 in NWFP, 02 in AJK) with the support of partners.

The partners include ministries of environment and population welfare, National Programmes on EPI, Maternal, Newborn and Child Health; UNICEF, Rural Support Programme Network, Plan International, PAIMAN, and PRIDE. The later two projects are being funded through USAID support.

The series of activities during the week includes public awareness activities at village and union council level, supplemented by immunization and deworming for children, tetanus toxoid vaccination for pregnant mothers, refresher trainings for health workers, and strengthened public health systems to ensure that Oral Rehydration Salts (ORS) and other essential supplies are available and correctly used. Each pregnant woman will also receive counselling on recognition of danger signs among mothers and newborns, the importance of at least four ANC visits, delivery by a skilled birth attendant, post natal care, early initiation of breast feeding, exclusive breast feeding, immunization of the child and optimal birth spacing.