The impact of the worldwide Millennium Development Goals campaign on maternal and under-five child mortality reduction: ‘Where did the worldwide campaign work most effectively?’

Abstract

Background: As the Millennium Development Goals campaign (MDGs) came to a close, clear evidence was needed on the contribution of the worldwide MDG campaign. Objective: We seek to determine the degree of difference in the reduction rate between the pre-MDG and MDG campaign periods and its statistical significance by region. Design: Unlike the prevailing studies that measured progress in 1990–2010, this study explores by percentage how much MDG progress has been achieved during the MDG campaign period and quantifies the impact of the MDG campaign on the maternal and under-five child mortality reduction during the MDG era by comparing observed values with counterfactual values estimated on the basis of the historical trend. Results: The low accomplishment of sub-Saharan Africa toward the MDG target mainly resulted from the debilitated progress of mortality reduction during 1990–2000, which was not related to the worldwide MDG campaign. In contrast, the other regions had already achieved substantial progress before the Millennium Declaration was proclaimed. Sub-Saharan African countries have seen the most remarkable impact of the worldwide MDG campaign on maternal and child mortality reduction across all different measurements. In sub-Saharan Africa, the MDG campaign has advanced the progress of the declining maternal mortality ratio and under-five mortality rate, respectively, by 4.29 and 4.37 years. Conclusions: Sub-Saharan African countries were frequently labeled as ‘off-track’, ‘insufficient progress’, or ‘no progress’ even though the greatest progress was achieved here during the worldwide MDG campaign period and the impact of the worldwide MDG campaign was most pronounced in this region in all respects. It is time to learn from the success stories of the sub-Saharan African countries. Erroneous and biased measurement should be avoided for the sustainable development goals to progress.

Assessing Changes in Inequality for Millennium Development Goals among Countries: Lessons for the Sustainable Development Goals

“…The indicator with the most significant improvement on average was cellular access, and the indicator with the smallest improvement was the school enrollment rate. We found promising aggregate results in the Sub-Sahara African, South Asian, and East Asian & Pacific regions, consistent with the results of previous studies focusing on the impacts of the MDGs in low-income countries (Cha 2017;Cuenca-García et al 2019). The infant mortality rate, GDP per capita, cellular device access, and school enrollment showed significant improvements among all regions on average, while the indicators for women in parliament, maternal and infant mortality, and HIV rates varied greatly across regions.…”

“…The infant mortality rate, GDP per capita, cellular device access, and school enrollment showed significant improvements among all regions on average, while the indicators for women in parliament, maternal and infant mortality, and HIV rates varied greatly across regions. Despite improvement, the variability in the indicator improvement across regions and income groups addressed in this study reemphasizes the previous research findings (Cha 2017;Reddy and Sen 2013;McClure et al 2018). By assessing the average results across four different income groups, we found that the lower and lower-middle income groups had the most significant improvements.…”

“…Last, this study finds a large data gap that impacts any MDG analysis, starting with the choice of indicators, and emphasizing the need to adopt consistent data tracking and measurement standards. This has been addressed in previous literature, which finds success in countries with a standardized tracking and measurement of indicators and little to no improvements in countries with large amounts of missing data (Jacob 2017;Oleribe and Taylor-Robinson 2016;Abbott et al 2017;Cha 2017;McClure et al 2018). This indicates a need for a worldwide data-collection and measurement system, which is critical for measuring the performance of development goals.…”

Determinants of prenatal care use and HIV testing during pregnancy: a population-based, cross-sectional study of 7080 women of reproductive age in Mozambique

“…As a part of overall human development process, countries in sub-Saharan Africa have been striving to reduce the high maternal and child mortality rates. Driven by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), many countries in the region have been able to make concrete improvements in this regard [1,2]. Nonetheless, the sub-Saharan African countries continue to account for a staggering 66% of all pregnancy and childbirth related deaths in the world [3].…”

A study of health determinants associated with disease prevalence among american children

“…Additionally, there may be a growing effort to explore additional factors which may also attribute to poor health among children's groups. Recent studies suggest that there are currently worldwide efforts in place to develop effective health related goals to try and reduce children's disease and mortality rates (Cha, 2017). To support such initiatives, current policies should address potential factors which may be associated with disease and negative health related out comes among children worldwide.…”