The Ministry of Health and Population has decided to set up a ‘special newborn care unit’ in all district hospitals throughout the country in a bid to lessen newborn deaths.

For that, concerned agencies under the Health Ministry have started training all doctors, nurses and paramedics serving in district hospitals of Nuwakot, Dhading, Sindhupalchok and Makawanpur.

“In the first phase, health workers serving in four selected district hospitals will receive necessary training on newborn care,” said Nisha Joshi, a public health officer at the Family Welfare Division under the Department of Health Services. “Health workers—all doctors, nurses, and paramedics serving in other hospitals—will also receive training in the coming days.”

Special newborn care units are general units designed to take care of newborn children who fall sick at a time of birth. Ailing children admitted in the unit are monitored by doctors, nurses and paramedics.

Nepal has committed to reducing the neonatal mortality rate to 12 in every 1,000 live births by 2030. However, the rate of newborn deaths has been stagnant since 2016, according to the Nepal Demographic and Health Survey-2022 carried out by the Ministry of Health and Population.

The nationwide study carried out between January 5 and June 22 this year with technical and financial support from the United States Agency for International Development shows that currently, 21 children in every 1,000 live births die within a month.

The government’s target for Sustainable Development Goals was to reduce the neonatal mortality rate to 16 deaths per every 1,000 live births by 2022.

SDGs, a follow-up on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), aims at ending poverty and hunger and all forms of inequality in the world by 2030, and Nepal has committed to meeting the goals.

“The training will help health workers identify the problems in the newborn babies and initiate necessary treatment immediately,” said Joshi. “We hope for an improvement in the ongoing death rate of newborn babies.”

The report shows that under-five mortality rate has declined to 33 from 39 in every 1,000 live births in 2016 and infant mortality rate to 28 from 32 in 2016.

The government had targeted to reduce the under-five mortality rate to 27 and infant mortality rate to 20 in every 1,000 live births by 2022.

Eighty-five percent of all deaths among children under five in Nepal take place before a child’s first birthday, with 64 percent occurring during the child’s first month, according to the study.