Child Lives: The Pulitzer Center’s Interactive Map on Childhood Mortality
by The Daily Eye Team July 9 2014, 9:00 am Estimated Reading Time: 0 mins, 51 secsIt’s the nature of journalism to focus on what’s wrong and in a world that’s full of violence and suffering there’s no shortage of subjects. A new Pulitzer Center interactive map spotlights instead a remarkable success, and one that has gone under-reported — the extraordinary decline in the rate of child mortality. Health and development initiatives, public and private investment, and the rising tide of economic growth have together made possible improvements in maternal healthcare and treating malnutrition and preventable, communicable diseases. The result, according to UNICEF: Ninety million lives saved since 1990 alone. Yet while innovative programs at the local and national level have made significant progress, over those same years another 216 million children died. Few developing countries are on target to meet Millennium Development Goals to reduce child mortality. One in ten children in sub-Saharan Africa still die before reaching their fifth birthday, making the region account for nearly half of the world’s under-five deaths.