The World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean held a regional IMCI coordinators’ meeting in Sana’a, Yemen, from 6 to 9 December 2010. The main objective of the meeting was to review progress of implementation of the Integrated Management of Child Health (IMCI) strategy and progress towards Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 4 on reduction of under-five mortality and discuss new initiatives and actions to move the child health agenda forward. More specifically, the objectives of the meeting were to:

• present progress in under-five mortality reduction and implementation of the IMCI strategy in countries in the Region
• discuss initiatives to increase access to quality child health care, such as community health workers and mobile teams
• discuss approaches to sustainability of the IMCI strategy, including progress in IMCI preservice education
• present updates on child health at regional and global level, including new tools and approaches
• share child health-related success stories of countries in the Eastern Mediterranean Region and discuss actions to move the child health agenda forward in the Region.

There has been progress towards MDG 4 in the Region with an overall reduction of 30% in under-five mortality between 1990 and 2009. Three countries, notably Egypt, Lebanon and Oman, have already surpassed MDG 4, five countries are on track and the rest are making insufficient progress (some countries in the Region have already achieved a low level of under-five mortality).

Related link

Report on the regional IMCI Coordinators' meeting Sana'a, Yemen, 6–9 December 2010