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Children’s Health Around the World
Team Square
01/06/2021
Team Members:
- Yasemin Dikme - 090160313
- Aslı Kılıç - 090160303
Project Description
Project Data& Access to data
We aimed to find a reliable source for the project. We made sure that the datasets we use are suitable for use and ethical. That is why we used the datasets from the UNICEF and WHO (World Health Organization) dataset archives.
You can access our datasets from the official UNICEF Data site, WHO Global Health Observatory data repository and The WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) dataset.
Additionally we used the United Nations dataset to determine geographic regions and NASA World Map dataset for geospatial data.
The datasets we use contain data on different health problems faced by children. There are topics that we especially want to deal with.
Actions Taken
We aimed to make our project understandable and easy to read. We used various graphics and maps for this. Instead of tiring the readers with numbers and complex data, we wanted to explain the data with colors and shapes.
First we loaded the packages we will use on our project. Then, in order to import our data, we checked the current working directory.
Since we wanted to show the data we obtained about the children from different countries on the map, we pulled the “world map” data set from NASA. Some of the countries were written differently on the world map dataset. We changed the names of misspelled countries to match the other datasets.
Stillbirths
A baby who dies after 28 weeks of pregnancy, but before or during birth, is classified as a stillbirth [1].
According to our hypothesis, there is a relationship between the development levels of countries and the stillbirth rates of countries. To demonstrate this, we imported the dataset of UNICEF showing the stillbirth rate of the countries by years and the dataset showing the development levels of the countries. All of the datasets had different types of uncertainty bounds, such as lower, median and upper. According to UNICEF, lower and upper refer to the lower bound and upper bound of 90% uncertainty intervals. We will use the “Median Uncertainty Bound” or “Point Estimate” on our project.
To get a clear observation, we obtained two new datasets by averaging the stillbirth rate of the countries between 2010 to 2015 and 2015 to 2019. Then we combined this two datasets with the development level of the countries and mapped the datasets.
Stillbirths rate between 2000 to 2005 and the development level of countries.
Stillbirth rates between 2014 to 2019 and the development level of countries:
As we can see on the map; While the stillbirth rate is low in most developed countries, stillbirth rates are high in underdeveloped (developing) countries.
Let’s take a closer look at this data and countries with the highest mortality rates.
As the graph above shows, countries with the highest stillbirth rates showed a big improvement throughout the years, as the stillbirth rates decreased. We want to see the contribution of the change in GDP and health expenditure of the countries in past 20 years on this decrease.
Now we will analyze the relationship between the stillbirth rates between the years 2000-2005 and the years 2014-2019 and the GDP and the budget allocated to health system of the respected years.
According to WHO, most stillbirths are preventable With quality health care throughout pregnancy and childbirth. To prevent stillbirths, good health and good nutrition before and during pregnancy, quality maternity care and qualified health staff during birth is necessary. And it is seen from the results above that there is a great relationship between the provision of this quality services with the economic situation of countries and the importance they attach to health care. As we can see from the examples above, when GDP and the budget allocated to health services increases, all of the necessary services can be provided for the baby and mother, hence why the stillbirth rates decrease.
Now we will move on to the next important health problem of children’s health around the world. Which is malnutrition.
Malnutrition
Malnutrition refers to deficiencies or excesses in nutrient intake, an imbalance of essential nutrients. Malnutrition includes, stunting, underweight, overweight and obesity.
Now let’s take a look at the stunting, overweight and underweight rates around the world.
Now we will analyze the relation between income groups and malnutrition types such as stunting, overweight and underweight.
As we can see from the chart above, while the overweight rates are very high in high income levels, stunting and underweight rates are vert low. In countries with high income levels, problems such as stunting and underweight are not encountered in children but in countries with low and low to middle income levels, underweight and stunting rates are very high in children.
In the previous maps, we can see that that stunting and underweight rates are very high in countries in South Asia such as Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Iran, Afghanistan and Nepal. And the overweight rates are very low in this countries. If we take a look at the average GDP of the regions between 2000-2020, we can see that South Asia has the second lowest GDP between all the other regions. (The lowest region is Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa but we don’t have any information on this region on our datasets.) We can say that the regions with low GDP have the highest stunting and underweight rates while the regions such as East Asia has the lowest stunting and underweight rates.
We can say that undernutrition is an important problem in countries with low and low to middle income levels. The economic status of countries is very important in terms of adequate nutrition and regular healthy development of individuals. The consequences of malnutrition are risky for people of all ages, but malnutrition at an early age causes problems in the development of children and causes many health problems in later ages.
Child mortality rates
According to WHO, in 2019 an estimated 5.2 million children under 5 years died mostly from preventable and treatable causes. The causes of death in children were determined to be preventable and treateble diseases such as diarrhoea and malaria. Such diseases can be prevented or treated with access to simple, affordable interventions including immunization, adequate nutrition, safe water and food and quality care by a trained health provider when needed [2].
Considering this information, we want to analyze the mortality rates of children around the world.
We will first import the infant, under 5 years old and 5 to 14 years old child mortality rates from 2000 to 2019 from UNICEF and combine them.
Then we will visualize the average mortality rates data and show the countries average GDP between 2000 to 2019 on our map once again to observe the relation with each other.
As we can see in the maps, it is seen that the child mortality rates are high in countries with an economic situation below the average, while the child mortality rates are low in countries that are in good economic condition. In other words, we can say that economic factors have an effect on the death rate. Deprivation of adequate health care, clean water and basic hygiene are examples of economic factors that affect mortality.
Diarrhea and malaria are two diseases that still cause child mortality in the world, although there are treatments. We claim that deprivation of clean water and basic hygiene cause diarrhea and malaria.
According to WHO, diarrhoeal disease is the second leading cause of death in children under five years old, and is responsible for killing around 525.000 children every year and in 2019, children aged under 5 years accounted for 67% (274 000) of all malaria deaths worldwide.
Therefore, we will first analyze preventable and treatable causes of child deaths, such as diarrhoea and malaria and then we will investigate the reasons behind them. (The only dataset we could find on deaths due to diarrhea belongs to 2017. For this reason, we will conduct our investigations over 2017.)
We want to compare the change in death by diarrhoeal diseases between 2000 and 2017. We first imported 2017 data from our dataset and only selected the countries with the most death rates to analyze better.
We know that diarrhoea is caused by infection in the intestinal tract and it can be spread through contaminated drinking water or poor hygiene. Because of this we will analyze the access to drinking water, basic sanitation and hygiene rates of countries.
Access to drinking water, Sanitation Services and Basic Hygiene
According to UNICEF and WHO, Basic Water is drinking water from an improved source, provided collection time is not more than 30 minutes for a roundtrip including queuing.
Sanitation services refer to the management of excreta from the facilities used by individuals, through emptying and transport of excreta for treatment and eventual discharge or reuse.Accoring to WHO and UNICEF, “Basic Sanitation” refers to use of improved facilities which are not shared with other households.
Hygiene has an important part in maintaning a healthy lifestyle and preventing the spread of diseases. Handwashing with soap and water is very effective in infectious diseases. According to WHO and UNICEF, “Basic Hygiene” refers to availability of a handwashing facility on premises with soap and water in 2017 is given.
Maps below show the rates of basic water access, basic sanitation services and basic hygiene data of the countries around the world.
Countries above have the highest rates in death by diarrhoeal diseases. And we can see from the chart that, Chad, which has the lowest rates in basic hygiene, access to drinking water and sanitation services has the highest rate in death. Death rates and basic hygiene, access to drinking water and sanitation services rates of all the countries on our data can be seen on the map below.
Life expectancy is very low in countries with low economic levels because it is difficult to reach adequate and effective health services in these countries. Many children die from treatable and preventable diseases, such as malaria, because they are not able to reach adequate and effective health services. Another result of low economic levels is deprivation of clean water and basic hygiene. Safe and accessible drinking water and having access to sanitation services is very important for public health. Lack of hygiene, unsafe drinking water and unimproved sanitation services can cause diarrhoea and when it is not treated, it can result with death.
Malaria is another deadly disease that has a big share in the causes of child deaths around the world.
Malaria is a deadly diseases transmitted to people through the bites of infected female Anopheles mosquitoes. It is preventable and curable. It can be prevented by taking necessary actions such as indoor residual spraying and antimalarial drugs. But many children around the world don’t have access to such preventions.
Our data includes the death by malaria of children aged 0-4 years in the years between 2000 and 2017.
We will first observe the change in death by malaria rates in 2000 and in 2017 and then analyze it’s relation with health expenditure.
The chart above shows us that death by malaria has decreased significantly since 2000 to 2017 for the countries with the highest death rates in 2017, which are “Burkina Faso”,“Central African Republic”,“Sierra Leone” and “Togo”.
And the health expenditure increased from 2000 to 2017 for the countries “Burkina Faso”,“Central African Republic”,“Sierra Leone” and “Togo”. This shows that, when sufficient budget is allocated to health services and diseases are properly treated, a noticable decrease in mortality rates is seen.
Results and Discussion
As we have seen as a result of our research and comparisons there is a strong relationship between the economic levels, income status and development levels of countries and child health, as we claimed. While examining the mortality rates of children in our project, we specifically addressed stillbirths, mortality rates between the ages of 0-14 and mortality rates by malaria and diarrheal diseases. We have obtained results by associating these groups with the development levels and economic income levels of countries and regions. The results we achieved in our project are as follows: 1) While the death rates are low in countries with a high level of development, these rates are higher in underdeveloped countries. 2) With the increase in the GDP of the countries, there was a decrease in the death-birth rates. 3) There is a relationship between the income level of the countries and the nutrition-related health problems of children. In low-income countries, the rate of underweight and stunting is high, while the rate of overweight is low. In high-income countries, the situation is the opposite; While the average of underweight and stunting is low, the average of overweight is high. 4) Child mortality rates in ages 0-14 are higher in countries with the lowest gdp rate. 5) Diarrhea-related child mortality rates are higher in countries where clean water and basic hygiene are not available. 6) Child mortality rates due to malaria can be reduced with necessary precautions and medications.
Of course, the factors that affect child health are not the only factors we examined. Whether new parameters, such as geographical or cultural factors, have an effect on child health, research should be conducted and solutions should be found. Every country should do its best to prevent child diseases and mortality rates, and instead of investing in sectors such as armament and war industry, countries should take action before it’s too late for children, who are the future of the world.
Conclusion
To sum it up, in our project we discussed the health problems of children around the world and what could cause them. Through our studies, we have seen that the level of development and economic status of countries are related to child health. According to the results we obtained, economic factors, although not alone, deeply affect children’s health. Deaths from diseases such as stillbirth, malaria, diarrhea, which can be prevented with clean, proper nutrition and quality health care, may decrease. Countries with strong economic power can allocate more budget for health care. Countries can use their budgets to prevent stillbirth, to treat pediatric diseases, or to prevent conditions that allow the disease to reproduce and spread, by providing quality health services. As we have seen as a result of our research, this has positive results on the health of children. Pediatric diseases can be prevented with different perspectives in new studies on the subject. For this, countries should focus on research on this subject and make their investments in this direction. With new perspectives and solutions, the problems that threaten child health can be solved globally.