Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
U of M aims to cut newborn deaths in India
Dr. Jamie Blanchard says Asia has high neonatal death rate. (PHIL.HOSSACK@FREEPRESS.MB.CA )
BABIES and new mothers in rural India will get a head start on health thanks to Bill Gates and the University of Manitoba.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has granted $8.4 million to U of M medical researchers to be channelled through the university's newly created Centre for Global Public Health, headed by Dr. Jamie Blanchard of the U of M's faculty of medicine.
Particularly in rural India, expectant mothers suffer high rates of hemorrhaging, hypertensive disorders (high blood pressure) and obstructed labour.
Major causes of newborn deaths are pre-term births, severe infections, and birth asphyxia.
"About 75 per cent of all neonatal deaths in the world occur in southern Asia. India's a major contributor to that," he said.
"India is an emerging global economy but it still has enormous needs and poverty."
Blanchard will lead a team seeking to improve maternal, neonatal and child health care and health care delivery in the state of Karnataka in south India, which has a population 15 million.
The U of M team is tasked with finding a signature model that could be used throughout India to deliver health care to rural mothers and newborns.
Most of the Gates Foundation money will be spent on training health-care providers in India. The project also aims to develop systems for educating families and communities on caring for babies.
It's a five-year program.
The Centre for Global Public Health was established a year ago. Blanchard and colleague Dr. Stephen Moses have garnered international recognition for their work on HIV prevention and control, and received more than $50 million in funding from the Gates Foundation.
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition December 8, 2009 A2
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