Recommendations for dry cord care should be reconsidered on the basis of these findings that early antisepsis with chlorhexidine of the umbilical cord reduces local cord infections and overall neonatal mortality.

No abstract

Daily supplementation of young children in southern Nepal with iron and folic acid with or without zinc has no effect on their risk of death, but might protect against diarrhoea, dysentery, and acute respiratory illness.

Maternal infections, prematurity, and multiple births are important risk factors for birth asphyxia mortality in the low-resource, community-based setting. Low socioeconomic status is highly associated with birth asphyxia, and the mechanisms leading to mortality need to be elucidated. The interaction between maternal infections and prematurity may be an important target for future community-based interventions to reduce the global impact of birth asphyxia on neonatal mortality.

SummaryBackground-Zinc supplementation can reduce subsequent morbidity in children recovering from diarrhoea and respiratory illness in developing countries. However, whether routine supplementation would decrease morbidity and mortality in populations with zinc deficiency is unclear. We assessed the effect of daily zinc supplementation on children in southern Nepal.