Manila Declaration for Improving Child Survival and Child Rights

Be it known to all men and women:

• Whereas, over 9 million children under five die in the world each year, mainly from preventable conditions,
  
• Whereas, the leading causes of deaths are neonatal diseases, pneumonia, diarrhea, malaria, measles and malnutrition,
  
• Whereas, child health interventions have been recommended by WHO and UNICEF and are the most cost-effective measures to improve child survival,
  
• Whereas, these child survival interventions include:
  

1. skilled birth attendants
2. newborn care
3. exclusive breastfeeding for 6 months and complementary feeding
4. micronutrient supplementation and deworming
5. vaccination
6. integrated management of severe childhood illnesses and malnutrition
7. prevention of accidents, injuries and child abuse
8. birth spacing and mother support

• Whereas, every child has the right to all of these interventions to decrease morbidity and mortality and thus achieve Millennium Development Goal 4,
• Whereas, the “BATA MOVEMENT” which is an organization composed of government and non-government organizations was launched in Manila on April 11, 2008 with a “March for Child’s Rights to Survival” and has for its main objective to increase awareness of the child survival interventions, and
• Whereas, the 8th International Congress of Tropical Pediatrics, with distinguished international speakers from all over the world, concurred and endorsed these child survival intervention.

Now, the members of the International Society of Tropical Pediatrics, the University of the Philippines-National Institutes of Health, the Philippine Ambulatory Pediatric Association, and all the participants of 8th International Congress of Tropical Pediatrics declare their commitment for the adoption and promotion of the child survival interventions and call for greater efforts to be undertaken by governments, international organizations and the private sector to achieve the Millennium Development Goal 4 (reduce child mortality by two thirds until the year 2015) in all countries of the world.

Considering the full magnitude of early childhood potentials and the present dimensions and potentials of child health and child rights, and the grave social, economic and political consequences of an impending ‘brain gap’ seriously affecting the potentials, the productivity,opportunities, employability, citizenship, i.e. the whole future of our children – we adopt and ask all governments, institutions, societies and paediatricians to adopt and sincerely implement holistic and comprehensive programs of early childhood development which truly reflect the meaning of child rights and the highest attainable standards of physical,mental and social child health for every child in the world without discrimination.

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