The statistics are startling: In 2012, 6.6 million children under the age of five died worldwide. Nearly three million babies die every year in their first month of life, and a similar number are stillborn. And one million babies die on their first and only day of life. The worldwide child mortality rate is a major story that rarely makes it into the news media, child health experts say. Yet the problem has by no means been ignored. Fourteen years ago, in 2000, 189 countries came together at the United Nations (UN) headquarters to pledge to end extreme poverty and other hardships around the globe, including preventable child and maternal deaths. The declaration included several time-bound targets that became known as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Among the goals, countries pledged to reduce the mortality rate for children under age five by two-thirds, reduce the maternal mortality rate by three-quarters, and achieve universal access to reproductive health services-all by 2015.
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