Nairobi, Kenya -- Over 1.5 million children under the age of five and women of child-bearing age across the entire country of Somalia will benefit from a package of community-based preventive care.

The joint UN Children’s Fund and WHO-led campaign of ‘Child Health Days’ will protect children under five against preventable childhood diseases and water-borne illnesses. The campaign will also reduce malnutrition and safeguard women against neonatal tetanus in child delivery.

Somalia has limited social services, a weak health infrastructure and a volatile security situation, where one child in every 10 dies before its first birthday.

Historic campaign
“This campaign is historic because it marks the launch of multi-million dollar strategy to improve the survival rates of all Somali children,” says UNICEF Representative for Somalia, Christian Balslev-Olesen.

“It is our largest ever campaign and it relies on partnerships for its outreach and its success. We are aim to reach every single child under the age of five with this high-impact life-saving package of interventions.

“Working together, we can protect children and their mothers against preventable diseases, and make it possible to improve the lives of every Somali child.”

Wide range of help
The interventions include child immunization against measles, diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus and polio; Vitamin A supplementation; nutritional assessments; de-worming; the distribution of oral rehydration salts and water purification tablets; breastfeeding promotion; and tetanus toxoid vaccination of girls and women aged 15 – 49.

Messages raising awareness of the campaign have been sent via mosques, cell-phones, radio, TV and loudspeakers, and every Somali family is being urged to take advantage of this health care package. More than 3,600 field teams are taking the campaign to urban and rural areas of Somalia utilizing schools, health centres, mosques, and remote areas, mobile clinics.

Mother of two, Kaltun (28) – who brought her nine month old son Saad to the campaign launch – is enthusiastic about the campaign.

“I want to prevent my child getting measles and other diseases” she says. “My first child is healthier than this baby because he was vaccinated”