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IN-DEPHT STUDY |
| 6 JANUARY – MISSIONARY CHILDHOOD
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| LIFE OR SURVIVAL? |
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In 25 countries in the world 15% of children die before
they are 5 years old. We have been aware of these figures for a long
time and nothing serves to reduce them, not even vaccination campaigns,
building more medical centres, dispensaries, basic health education
to mothers.
And there is nothing more painful than to think of a new born child
suffering from hunger, disease, dehydration, abandonment or other
diseases easily preventable with low cost drugs.
The main causes of this terrible “slaughter of the holy innocents”
are: diarrhoea, tetanus, chicken pox, whooping-cough, pneumonia. And
while AIDS among children must be treated separately, these five diseases
can be prevented or treated with basic low cost medicines.
But when even the most basic forms of hygiene are lacking, not to
mention medicine, what hope can there be for the destiny of all these
little ones?
The infant death rate is high in many countries in the south of the
world and it is estimated that every year about 20 million children
die soon after birth due to malnutrition of mothers during pregnancy. |
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