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600 Afghan children will die while leaders talk

More than 600 children will die today in Afghanistan as Gordon Brown and Hamid Karzai meet to discuss the future of the war-ravaged country.

Thursday 28 January 2010

A girl studying at a school for street working children in Fayzabad, Afghanistan. Many children in the country never live long enough to go to school — one in four children die before reaching their fifth birthday.

Afghan children face the worst chance of survival in the world. One in four will die before they reach their fifth birthday — many from easily preventable illnesses like pneumonia or diarrhoea.

In addition, 48 Afghan women will die from pregnancy-related problems today — because they cannot get to hospital in time or because there are no female doctors or equipment to treat them with.

We are calling on leaders to put the basic needs of the Afghan people at the heart of UK policy and to focus aid on sustainable support.

“There will only be lasting peace in Afghanistan when there are real improvements to the lives of the Afghan people,” said Patrick Watt, Save the Children’s Director of Development Policy. “They urgently need more doctors, midwives and teachers.”

“World leaders need to listen to the children of Afghanistan and their families, and provide them with long-term support so that their basic needs and human rights are met.”

We are calling for:

• The basic needs and fundamental human rights of Afghan people to be put at the heart of UK policy on Afghanistan
• Aid to be focussed on long-term projects that involve the local community
• Support for Afghan-led peace-building initiatives.

One in eight women dies during pregnancy

Afghanistan has the highest maternal mortality rate in the world after Sierra Leone. A woman dies from pregnancy-related causes every 30 minutes in the country. There is a one in eight chance a woman in Afghanistan will die from a pregnancy-related cause; in the UK the odds are only one in 8,200.

Save the Children is training health workers and midwives, educating working street children and rebuilding schools across Afghanistan. We have pledged to work with the Afghan government to run health and nutrition projects and to expand the health care system, especially in rural areas.

Read about our work in Afghanistan