By Ankita Mittal
Around the world, especially in rural areas of developing countries such as India and other parts of the Global South, weak health care delivery systems pose a significant threat to infants’ lives. Despite the fact that infant mortality rates are decreasing worldwide, the major cause of these preventable deaths (especially in the developing world) is the non-performance of the key health functions such as provision of vaccines, medicines, and nutritional supplements to pregnant women and children and promotion of safe health practices.
Vaccines, medicines, and sound logistics in rural India are crucial in combating infant mortality since the absence of a poor cold chain to maintain the required temperatures can lead to the vaccine spoilage. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and UNICEF in India reported that the effectiveness of vaccines can be reduced if they are not stored properly, which means that infants may be unprotected against diseases like polio, tuberculosis, and hepatitis B.
It is the same story in rural areas of Africa and Southeast Asia, where poor infrastructure contributes to healthcare delivery challenges. Cold chain systems for vaccines in these regions are still not fully reliable, resulting in wastage and reduced potency of vaccines, thereby putting the health of little children at risk. Many of these challenges are further exacerbated by the absence of refrigerated transport and storage facilities, often due to unreliable electricity and poorly maintained infrastructure.
Another important aspect of healthcare delivery systems in the Global South that puts the lives of infants at risk is the unavailability of essential medicines in the healthcare facilities. Compounding the issue is a lack of trained healthcare professionals who can respond to neonatal emergencies in rural areas. This can delay critical interventions, leading to higher mortality rates among newborns due to preventable causes.
To address these gaps there is a need to take a holistic approach to the problem that would include allocating more resources and training of the human resource for healthcare – and perhaps the most important of all, establishing strong mechanisms for the delivery of the medicines, vaccines and other related health commodities to the rural population. One way to address this issue is through innovations in cold chain and logistics solutions, especially last-mile delivery systems designed to function efficiently in remote and off-grid areas.
By implementing an innovative, energy-saving cold chain, healthcare providers can guarantee the availability of a constant and reliable supply of vaccines, medicines, and other life-saving products even in areas with no constant power supply. Such technologies can be pivotal in the improvement of the current models of healthcare delivery to infants in rural regions.
Additionally, local governments, international organisations and corporates can form partnerships to build on such solutions to create a single solution to rural healthcare’s logical and infrastructural problems. The United Nations’ Gavi initiative is already playing a critical role in improving vaccine distribution and storage systems. Nevertheless, for such programs to further reduce infant mortality, they must grow to emphasize the need to continue monitoring the cold chain, particularly in remote regions with unreliable infrastructure.
Finally, the health and survival of infants depend on the availability of services and products and their timely and proper delivery. Thus, by improving the last-mile infrastructure and training healthcare workers, we can reduce infant mortality and give every child a chance to lead a healthy life.
The author is CEO of Enhanced Innovations.