Kenya slashes under-five deaths by 62pc, but newborn survival stalls
Researchers attribute the improvement to expanded immunisation, the introduction of free maternity care, community health worker programmes, and the large-scale rollout of HIV treatment after 2003.
What you need to know:
- Kenya’s under-five mortality rate declined from 101.4 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1990 to 38.8 in 2024, one of the most sustained reductions in East Africa over that period.
The number of children dying before age five in Kenya has fallen by nearly 62 per cent over the past three decades, dropping from 99,000 deaths a year in 1990 to 58,000 in 2024, according to a new United Nations report.
The 2025 report by the UN Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation, which tracks child survival data across 195 countries, shows Kenya’s under-five mortality rate declined from 101.4 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1990 to 38.8 in 2024, one of the most sustained reductions in East Africa over that period.
Researchers attribute the improvement to expanded immunisation, the introduction of free maternity care, community health worker programmes, and the large-scale rollout of HIV treatment after 2003.
Despite the overall progress, the report warns that gains are slowing. “Most of these losses were caused by conditions that are preventable or treatable with well-established, cost-effective interventions,” it states. “Moreover, progress in reducing child mortality has slowed or, for certain causes, begun to stall.”
Among children aged one to 59 months, malaria, pneumonia and diarrhoea account for roughly half of all deaths worldwide. Among newborns, prematurity, birth asphyxia and sepsis are responsible for close to eight in ten deaths globally.
While child mortality has fallen sharply, progress among newborns has been considerably slower. Kenya’s neonatal mortality rate: deaths in the first 28 days of life, fell from 26.7 to 20.7 per 1,000 live births between 1990 and 2024, a reduction of just 22 per cent.
As Kenya’s population grew over the same period, the number of neonatal deaths rose from 27,000 to 31,000 a year. Newborn deaths now account for more than half of all infant deaths in the country. The annual rate of improvement for neonatal mortality stands at 0.7 per cent, compared to 2.8 per cent for under-five mortality overall.
The report points to the nature of newborn deaths as a key reason for the slower progress.
“Neonatal deaths are more often due to causes such as prematurity and intrapartum-related complications, which are multifactorial and more complex to prevent and treat,” it states.
Unlike deaths from diarrhoea or malaria, which can be addressed through community programmes and basic medicines, deaths in the first month of life are closely tied to the quality of care at the moment of birth. They require skilled birth attendants, functioning facilities, warming equipment and oxygen, all of which remain unevenly available across Kenya, particularly in rural counties far from referral hospitals.
The data also shows a persistent gap between male and female child mortality. The male under-five mortality rate stood at 42.7 per 1,000 live births in 2024, compared to 34.7 for females, a difference of 23 per cent that has held across the entire period studied.
