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The Indian Government headed by President Shri Pranab Mukherjee, has poured plenty of praise to the child health workers in Malvani of Bombay City. On the outskirts of the Indian city of Bombay is a shantytown called Malvani, where disease has long been endemic. At last things are improving, thanks to energetic health workers such as Neetu and Aziz. They visit families to check whether the young children have been vaccinated or if they are suffering from diarrhea, scabies, or anemia. Neetu and Aziz are only 11 years old. They volunteered to work in a program in which older children are assigned to monitor the health of the children under five. Because of the efforts of Neetu and Aziz—and the efforts of dozens of other children like them — nearly all the youngsters of Malvani have been immunized, most parents know how to administer oral rehydration therapy, and general hygiene has improved. This has encouraged many youngsters not only in Malvani, but in the whole of Bombay City to come join the volunteering work. All over the world, enormous strides are being made to vaccinate young children against the most common diseases. Nigeria has now immunized over 65 percent of its infant population, Bangladesh has immunized over 70 percent, and China has immunized well over 95 percent. If every developing country could achieve the 90 percent mark, health experts believe that a collective immunity would result. When the vast majority are immunized, it is much harder for the disease to be transmitted. No wonder the World Health Organization (WHO) has outlined three tips to follow. They are as follows: • If all mothers in developing countries were persuaded to breast-feed their babies for at least four to six months, a million children would be saved annually. • The extensive use of oral rehydration therapy (ORT) could halve the death rate due to diarrhea, which kills four million children every year. • Widespread vaccination and the use of inexpensive antibiotics could prevent millions of other deaths due to diseases such as measles, tetanus, and pneumonia. • Educating folks on how to get rid of infections especially scabies which is one of the dreaded infections. Of course, giving “every child a better future” involves a lot more than saving them from a premature death. Sandra Huffman, president of the Center to Prevent Childhood Malnutrition, explains in Time magazine that “ORT doesn’t prevent diarrhea, it only saves children from dying from it. . . . What we need to do now,” she adds, “is focus on how we can prevent the illness, not just the death.” Many of these young lives could be saved by implementing the above health measures.
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