Mom & Newborn Baby Kits

Program Overview

The chance of a newborn dying is up to 50 times greater in the world’s riskiest places to give birth than those of the safest places. Across the Pacific, newborn mortality rates remain a serious concern. Nearly 1,700 children under the age of five years-old died in the Pacific in 2016. More than 80% of those children died within their first year of life and half of those children died in their first 28 days. Solomon Islands and Vanuatu have some of the highest death rates of newborns.

According to UNICEF Pacfic, one in 43 babies born in PNG does not survive and one in 85 in Vanuatu and in Fiji one in 114. 

Mother and child health as a key indicator of community welfare is measured by the Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) and Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) and across Melanesia, mothers and their newborn babies need help to begin their lives anew in a way that gives the newborn babies a chance for survival and most success as possible.

 One way to help newborn babies be successful is to provide them with supplies and provide the mom with knowledge. MWT aims to build kits and distribute them to hospitals in the regional centers like Suva, Port Vila, Honiara, and Port Moresby. The materials provided will be the local language and materials will be sustainable. The kits will be provided at the hospitals straight to the mothers with the intention of helping both mom and baby on their way to healthy living.