Save the Children!

By John Cheeran
World is a wonderful place indeed.
As debates abound about the futility of the lifetime and the rationale of Intelligent Design, God sometimes dominate the topic.
Men and women lament their losses when tsunamis strike but a report by Save the Children researchers say that an estimated 2 million babies die within their first 24 hours each year worldwide.
That is, silent but deadly tsunamis are sweeping across the globe relentlessly.
And who is watching over us?
Read more from a report by the Save the Children organisation.

Sub-Saharan Africa remains the worst place in the world to be a mother or child, with Scandinavian nations again taking the top spots in the rankings by the Connecticut-based humanitarian group.
Sweden heads the list, with Niger last. The "Mothers' Index" in the report ranks 125 nations according to 10 gauges of well-being -- six for mothers and four for children -- including objective measures such as lifetime mortality risk for mothers and infant mortality rate and subjective measures such as the political status of women.
Charles MacCormack, president and CEO of Save the Children, said the report card "illustrates the direct line between the status of mothers and the status of their children.
"In countries where mothers do well, children do well," he said in a written statement accompanying the report.
But each year, according to the report, more than a half-million women die as a result of pregnancy and childbirth difficulties, 2 million babies die within their first 24 hours, 2 million more die within their first month and 3 million are stillborn.
Causes of death in the developing world were dramatically different from those in the developed world, the report said. In industrialized nations deaths were most likely to result from babies being born too small or too early, while in the developing world about half of newborn deaths were from infection, tetanus and diarrhea.
Japan was among a number of nations highly ranked mainly because they offer free health services for pregnant women and babies, while the United States suffers from disparities in access to health care.
The report said almost all newborn and maternal deaths take place in developing nations -- 99 percent and 98 percent, respectively. The newborn mortality rates were particularly high in countries with a recent history of armed conflict, including Liberia and Sierra Leone.
Ranking at the bottom of the scorecard were Liberia, Afghanistan, Angola and Iraq -- countries where armed conflict and cultural practices impede newborn survival.
"It's tragic that millions of newborns die every year, especially when these deaths are so easily preventable," says the report.
"Three out of four newborn deaths could be avoided with simple, low-cost tools that already exist, such as antibiotics for pneumonia, sterile blades to cut umbilical cords and knit caps to keep babies warm."
The Mothers' Index -- which excluded some nations that lacked sufficient data -- highlights huge disparities between the nations at the top and the bottom of the list.
The report highlights the three areas it says have the most influence on child well-being: female education, presence of a trained attendant at birth and use of family planning services.
Educated women, the report said, are more likely to marry and give birth later in life, to seek health care and to encourage education for their children, including girls.
The report said that family planning and increased contraception use leads to lower maternal and infant death rates.
Many women and children in developing nations, it said, die as a result of births that come at the wrong time -- too close together, too early or too late in the mother's life..