Child mortality in the developing world

Several observers in the 1980s have suggested that there has been a major slowdown in the pace of child mortality decline because living standards are not improving very rapidly, and, more recently, because of structural adjustment policies designed to cope with deteriorating economic conditions. The authors find little basis for the conclusion that the pace of mortality decline has slowed in general. On the other hand, the effects of declining rates of economic growth and of structural adjustment policies on mortality, if they occur, take more time to become apparent. In addition, there is little evidence to support the notion that public health interventions merely change the causes or delay the occurrence of child deaths rather than actually prevent them. -from Authors