UNICEF: Under-5 child mortality on decline in turkey, other countries

The number of deaths among children under the age of 5 has been on a significant decline for over two decades in Turkey as well as several other middle income countries, according to a report released Wednesday night by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).According to the 2012 Progress Report on Committing to Child Survival: A Promise Renewed, low income countries such as Bangladesh, Liberia and Rwanda, middle income countries including Brazil, Mongolia and Turkey, and high income countries such as Oman and Portugal have made dramatic gains, lowering their under-5 mortality rates by more than two-thirds between 1990 and 2011.According to data provided by the report, the number of children under the age of 5 dying globally has dropped from nearly 12 million in 1990 to an estimated 6.9 million in 2011. In 2010, there were 7.6 million under-5 deaths. However, around 19,000 boys and girls around the world are still dying every day from largely preventable causes, the report said.UNICEF and partners place a heavy focus on preventable diseases. UNICEF Chief of Health Ian Pett said the fund is concentrating its energies much more on the countries where the biggest challenges remain. "We are focusing on the killers of children that haven't received enough attention yet," Pett said when introducing the UNICEF report to the international media. Those killers include pneumonia, which is responsible for 18 percent of deaths of children under 5, and diarrhea, which is responsible for 11 percent.