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Infant mortality has deteriorated significantly in recent years in our country, although welfare has increased and poverty has decreased, which logically should have had an impact on reducing the phenomenon, but the opposite has happened.
Eurostat in a summary report for the Western Balkans and Turkey noted that Albania had an infant mortality rate of 10.3 per 1000 live births, a phenomenon which remained high in 2020 with 10 infants per 1000 births. This rate was more than double the regional average, Eurostat reported.
After Albania, Kosovo ranks with the highest rate in the Region with 8.7 stillbirths per 100 births, Northern Macedonia with 5.6, Serbia with 4.8 and Montenegro with 2.4 (see attached graph). In the EU the average infant mortality rate for 2019 was 3.4.
In the last three years, Albania has overturned the efforts of three decades, when infant mortality resumed sharply. Official data show that nationwide, in 2020 281 babies up to 1 year old lost their lives, while in the previous year 293 babies, the highest level since 2012. The growth of the phenomenon for the second year occurred at a time when births fell rapidly. In 2019, Albania had an infant mortality rate almost double that of the region, and the highest in Europe. The indicator, although slightly declining, remained high for 2020 as well.
INSTAT publications show that, during 2020, fatalities in the ages 0-1 years increased significantly in the regions of Gjirokastra, Korca, Lezha, Elbasan and Vlora, compared to the previous year, from 9 – 100% by region. Public health experts in the country explain that Albania, since the beginning of the 1990s, had significantly improved mortality to 1 year.
The recurrence of the phenomenon in the counties, according to them, shows that the health system, especially in neonatal care, is facing weaknesses in the assistance provided to the baby in the first 28 days of life. Even the official data, in fact, show exactly this weakness, as the highest number of fatalities is billed for complications in pregnancy, childbirth, during and after childbirth. In 2019, from this anomaly lost the battle with the lives of 42 babies more than in 2018. Fatalities from respiratory diseases marked an increase of 400% compared to 2018.
Public health experts point to the lack of medical equipment and doctors as the cause, especially in the counties. The Ministry of Health, which collects real-time data on births and fatalities of infants, did not comment on the phenomenon, passing this responsibility on to the Institute of Public Health (IPH).
Sources from maternity staff claim that there is a shortage of neonatal specialties and equipment.
Neonatology is a branch of pediatrics that treats the health of babies in the first 28 days of life. Having a specific focus and for a short period of the baby’s life, pediatricians do not prefer to specialize in this area. They find it more appropriate to work as a general pediatrician, as they will cover health problems for children up to 14 years old, unlike neonatologists who have to specify for one-month-old babies./Monitor
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