Infant and Early Childhood Mortality in Shewa Region: An Investigation into the Levels and Differentials
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Date
1991-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Available evidellce show that 1I0t ollly is child mortality ill Ethiopia amollg the highest ill the world,
there are also cOllsiderable differences ill chalices of survival a11l0llg children of differellt populatioll groups.
Nevertheless, the different aspects of child mortality are still far from sufficielltly documellted. In an effort
to fill some of the gaps ill this respec4 this study sought firs4 to detennille levels alld trends of child
mortality usillg a 5 percellt sample of womell from the 1984 census data for Shewa region. Because of its
cultural alld climatic diversity,Shewa provides all ideal settingfor such all undertakillg. Secolld, attempt was
also made to filld out the differences in child survival in a uni- alld bivariate study followed by a
multivariate analysis of the detem.illants of child mortality.
Using the Trussell procedure, illfant mortality rate (IMR) is estimated as high as 101 deaths per
1000 live births for Shewa region. The correspolldillg child (,lJ,) and ullder five mortality (,Q,) are 73 and
167 respectively. This means that one out of every six children in the region failS to reach his/her fifth
birthday. Furthermore, no improvement in child mortality in the recent past is detected- In the 1970s it
remained COllstallt fluctuating around 160 deaths per 1000 live births for both sexes.
When attelltion is focussed all the differellces in child mortality among different population
subgroups, the expected strong negative relationship between child mortality alld education of mother is
evidellt. aile revealing aspect of this study is the prevalence of strong regional difference in child mortality
in Shewa region. Thus, the illcidellce of child death is much more frequent ill the three south em Awrajas
of Haikoch-Butajiru, Kembata-Hadiya and Chebo-Gurage than in the central Awrajas of Menageshu, Selale
alld Tegulet-Bulga. Moreover, child survival advantages of the Amara ethllic group over that of the Gurage,
Christialls over Moslems alld the currently married women over other marriage categories are observedIt emerged from the study that acquirillg more pertillellt data, expalldillg educatiollal opportunity
for womell, redressillg the regiollal imbalance ill child mortality will go a IOllg way ill reducillg child
mortality ill this country
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Childhood Mortality in Shewa Region