According to the latest bulletin issued by the Epidemiology Department at the Ministry of Health, neonatal mortality has reduced by 29% over the same period last year, with around 554 deaths per 10,000 live births. The director of the National Health Service (SNS), Chanel Rosa Chupany confirmed that although this was progress, pressing challenges remain to ensure more babies survive their first month of birth. In the country, eight out of every 100 births are premature, and this is the leading cause of neonatal mortality during the first 28 days of life.
Rosa Chupany said that 63% of the babies had been born at less than 34 weeks in 500 cases of early deaths occurring in ten public hospitals around the country.
The neo-mortality statistics are marked by the high number of Haitian mothers that cross the border to give birth in the Dominican Republic. For most of these, there is no previous medical record, and in many cases, the birth is a complicated one.
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Listin Diario
18 November 2019