Is Africa jinxed? 

Francis Kokutse, in Accra, Ghana  

Francis Kokutse is a journalist based in Accra and writes for Associated Press (AP), University World News, as well as Science and Development.Net. He was a Staff Writer of African Concord and Africa Economic Digest in London, UK. 

Each time programmes and policies are put in place to improve the lives of the very poor across the African continent, nothing good is achieved. The Millenium Development Goals (MDGs)  have come and gone, yet the poor in Africa did not benefit much. Now, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have been put in place across the world, and it is becoming clear that Africa will once again not meet these goals.

What is painful is that  African leaders do not seem to show any remorse when they fail the poor. It is like the only thing that Africa’s political class think about is what will improve their personal fortunes. The poor who are becoming paupers are left on their own.

The latest bad news is that, with the year 2030 approaching, for the end of  the SDGs, Africa has shown once again that, when it comes to meeting international targets, the continent cannot be counted upon. In fact, a new  study has confirmed that most sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries are far from meeting the target  SDG3.2. This is intended to reduce newborn and child mortality by 2030, end preventable deaths of newborns and children under five years of age, with all countries aiming to reduce neonatal mortality and under‑5 mortality.

The study mentioned countries in the high clusters, Nigeria, Niger, Togo, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, and the Central African Republic, as those who may not achieve the SDG target 3.2  except urgent and right investments are made.

In their study, “Assessing Africa’s child survival gains and prospects for attaining SDG target on child mortality,” the authors said  their  research revealed that eight countries, mainly from North Africa, have achieved the SDG target 3.2 while a few are close to the target.

“There is a need to address poor access to quality health care, poverty, female illiteracy, limited access to safe water, and poor access to quality family planning services. Considering the insufficient progress towards achieving SDG target 3.2 in SSA, a much stronger framing, better coverage and more effective child health interventions are urgently needed to accelerate child survival gains in the region,” the authors said.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO),  substantial  global progress has been made in reducing childhood mortality since 1990. The total number of under-5 deaths worldwide has declined from 12.8 million in 1990 to 4.9 million in 2022. Since 1990, the global under-5 mortality rate has dropped by 59 percent, from 93 deaths per 1000 live births in 1990 to 37 in 2022.

Globally, the number of neonatal deaths also declined, from 5.2 million in 1990 to 2.3 million in 2022. However, the decline in neonatal mortality from 1990 to 2022 has been slower than that of post-neonatal under-5 mortality. There are approximately 6,300 newborn deaths every day, amounting to nearly 47 percent of all child deaths under the age of five years.

Unfortunately, survival gains have stalled significantly since 2015, and 59 countries will fall short of meeting the SDG target for under-5 mortality and 64 countries will not achieve the SDG target for neonatal mortality.

In their research, the authors undertook a multi-country secondary analysis of datasets from multiple sources. The datasets were obtained from the World Development Indicator (WDI), WHO’s Global Health Observatory (GHO) Data, Demographic and Health Survey (DHS), and Human Development Report (HDR) with survey years ranging from 2006 to 2018.

Similar methodologies were employed in conducting various surveys across different countries; as such, the datasets are nationally representative and comparable across countries. The surveys routinely elicit demographic, socio-economic, environmental, and health information across developing countries every five years. Details of data collection methodologies particularly for DHS data for different countries are available in the final reports for the selected countries.

They said the  unit of analysis in the study is the individual African country with the corresponding country-level estimates on children under the age of five years and women of reproductive ages (15–49 years). Besides, there are inequalities in U5MRs between and within countries. While the mortality estimates for 54 African countries were obtained from the DHS’s STATcompiler and WHO’s GHO data, other estimates were obtained from the WDI and HDR.

The authors said, prior  to the introduction of SDGs, the highest IMR, measured per 1,000 live births, were recorded in Central African Republic (95.6), Sierra Leone (95.5), Somalia (88.0), Chad (79.8), DRC (77.9), Lesotho (73.0) and Equatorial Guinea (72.4). The least were recorded in Libya (12.4), Seychelles (12.5), Mauritius (12.8), Tunisia (15.0) and Cabo Verde (19.5).

“By 2018, none of the countries with the highest IMR has achieved any significant decline. For instance, none of the countries with 50 or more infant deaths (per 1,000 live births) has achieved up to 20% decline in IMR except Malawi with a 36.4% decline from 66.0 to 42.0 deaths; Cameroon with 22.6% decline from 62.0 to 48.0; Uganda and Swaziland with 20.4% decline each from 54.0 to 43.0 deaths,” they said.

They found that the lowest percentage decline was recorded in South Sudan (0.5%), Nigeria (2.9% decline from 69.0 to 67.0), Mali (3.6% decline from 56.0 to 54.0) and Guinea with no changes. Most of the other African countries with less than 50 infant deaths per 1,000 live births have achieved about 10.3–21.7% decline, except Zambia (6.7% decline), Benin with 31.0% increase and Mauritius (6.2% increase).

Of the 54 African countries they studied, only eight countries: Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Morocco and Algeria from North Africa, Seychelles and Mauritius from East Africa and Cabo Verde from West Africa have achieved U5MR reduction to a maximum of 25 deaths per 1,000 live births. While Sao Tome, Principe, South Africa, Rwanda, Botswana, Namibia, and a few East African countries are close to the target, all other African countries are far from the goal.

Examining the trends, the U5MR was more than 100 deaths per 1,000 live births (pre-SDG era) in 11 countries: Somalia (142.3), Central African Republic (138.0), Chad (137.9), Sierra Leone (136.7), Nigeria (128.0), Guinea (123.0), Cameroon (122.0), Malawi (112.0), DRC (104.2), Niger (103.2) and Equatorial Guinea (100.7). By 2018, while Malawi and Cameroon had recorded 42.9% and 34.4% decline, respectively, others had recorded about 13.7–23.1% decline except Guinea (9.8% decline) and Nigeria which had conversely recorded about 3.1% increase.

According to the authors, among countries with below 100 under-five deaths per 1,000 live births, Morocco, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Senegal, Swaziland, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Angola, Zimbabwe, and Uganda have achieved a substantial decline of about 20.0–28.9%, while others have cut under-five mortality by 12.4–19.6%. However, South Sudan, Algeria, Tunisia, and Seychelles recorded a less than 10% decline while other countries (Mali, Benin, and Mauritius recorded an increase.

Poor child survival gains observed among SSA countries with little progress towards the SDG target 3.2 demonstrate the need to accelerate progress through concerted approaches tailored to address each country’s context and child survival priorities. In contrast, North African countries such as Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia have received credits for meeting the SDG targets on reducing under-five mortality through increased access to neonatal and obstetric care, quality improvements in antenatal and delivery services, decisive leadership for maternal and child health programmes, and extensive implementation of the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) strategy.

“The significant child survival gains of a considerably large number of Northern African countries are pointers that reduction of U5MR is possible in SSA through strategic socioeconomic, public health, and political commitments and prioritisation of programmes on child survival,” the authors said.

Given what this study has brought to light, it means our leaders must give a new definition to wealth creation so that the very poor in society can benefit. It also means a re-examination of the way our political class see liberal economy as meaning they must amass wealth without seeking the welfare of the broader public. Truth be told, they know the problems on the continent because when it is time to campaign, they go to every corner and therefore they know what to do. After winning elections, they look at the poverty-stricken areas as “hard to reach.”

This must end!

• business a.m. commits to publishing a diversity of views, opinions and comments. It, therefore, welcomes your reaction to this and any of our articles via email: comment@businessamlive.com