Maternal mortality rates declining in Zambia-Wina

Minister of Gender and Child Development says maternal mortality rate in Zambia has been declining although the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) target of 162.3 deaths per 100,000 live births is far from being achieved.

Ms. Wina said child mortality rate has declined by almost 30 percent since 1992 but is still unacceptably high.

She said this in Lusaka today during a breakfast meeting to update delegates on the recently held 58^th session of the commission on the status of women.

Ms. Wina said the mortality rate of children aged below five year dropped from 190.7 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1992 to 137.6 per 1,000 live births in 2010.

She also said although poverty is still an issue, Zambia’s current progress report of 2013 shows that extreme poverty reduced from 58 percent in 1991 to 42.3 percent in 2010.

Ms. Wina said this decline was not uniform across gender and geographical regions in that women, especially those in rural areas were still adversely affected.

The 58^th session of the commission was held from 10^th to 21^st March 2014 in New York.