Countdown to 2015 for Maternal, Newborn and Child Survival

"What the Countdown really illustrates is the importance of good quality data for accountability of all of the partners…"

Dr Peter Salama, Chief of Health, UNICEF

“Progress on MDGs is real but is insufficient.  Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia are bearing an increasing brunt of maternal, child and newborn mortality, more than 80% for both.  HIV and conflict are critical underlying constraints to making progress in these countries.”
 
"Maternal and newborn health is becoming a paramount issue for us to address if we are to make gains on under-five mortality or, indeed, make substantial gains on maternal mortality.  The progress for schedulable services is there, but it is less for clinical services.  And, the continuum of care is failing and it is particularly failing for poor women and children who are falling behind.”
 
"What the Countdown really illustrates is the importance of good quality data for accountability of all of the partners: the Countdown partners, the governments and the partnerships that they represent, and the global community in its efforts to try to reduce maternal, newborn, and child mortality.  This data is critical and we hope that it will be used for action in these countries in the future.”
 
 
Mr.  Anders B.  Johnnson, Secretary General, Inter-Parliamentary Union
 
“What does the IPU expect to get out of this?  We expect to get out of this awareness on our behalf and a commitment on the behalf of our institutions and on the members of parliament concerned to go back to their countries and to look at the laws, look at the policies, examine the budgets, and see what they can do in Parliaments to get things right, to get the benefit of this meeting to bring all of that back to their parliaments and to start working on it."