Helping Babies Breathe Trains 300,000 Health Workers to Save Newborn Lives
USAID Bureau for Global Health sent this bulletin at 06/08/2015 09:05 AM EDT
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The
World Health Organization estimates 1 million newborns die each year from birth
asphyxia – the inability to breathe immediately after delivery. Between
2010 and 2015, the Helping Babies Breathe (HBB) Global Development Alliance, an
innovative public-private partnership, helped to train nearly 300,000
health workers in 77 countries to save newborns within the first minute of life.
In
its 5-year progress report, just released, Helping Babies Breathe reports the
first countries to adopt and implement this training are seeing promising
results.
Seven
countries (Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India, Malawi, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe)
reported newborn resuscitation success rates ranging from 79 percent to 89
percent.
In
Tanzania, the impact study of HBB conducted among 80,000 births over 2 years
reported significant reductions in early newborn mortality (47 percent) and in stillbirth
(24 percent).
Helping
Babies Breathe is part of the Survive & Thrive Global Development
Alliance of U.S. Government,
professional-health-association, private-sector and non-profit partners working
alongside country governments and health professionals to improve health
outcomes for mothers, newborns and children.
Watch
a webinar today at 10 a.m. ET with U.S. Agency for International Development’s (USAID's)
Lily Kak, USAID's senior advisor for global partnerships and newborn health