Kathmandu, January 28:

The government has extended the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) programme to 16 more districts. Now, the programme, which has an aim to reduce under-five child mortality, covers 64 districts across the country and would cover all 75 districts in the next fiscal year.

The programme is an approach developed by the WHO and UNICEF and was being implemented by the government to reduce mortality among the under-five children from 1998.

The IMCI programme also helps improve skills of health workers to deliver quality care to children, improve health system and ensures good supply of health care. “It makes health workers in districts able to handle childhood illnesses properly under UNESCO and WHO standard,” Dr Bhim Acharya, chief IMCI section, CHD said.

“The IMCI programme has been a milestone to reduce five major childhood illnesses including diarrhoea, Acute Respiratory Infections, measles, malnutrition and malaria, which accounted for about 70 per cent of child deaths,” Acharya said.

A recent report released by UNICEF has stated that there has been 67 per cent reduction in under-five mortality rate in the last decade in Nepal.

“If the programme is universalised in Nepal, we will very soon be able to meet the target of reducing under-five child mortality rate by two-third, one of the Millennium Development Goals before 2015,” Acharya said.