National Maternal and Child Health Program

The improvement in the maternal and child health status is crucial to obtain. The social sector aims for poverty reduction and it is part of all policy documents of the government of Pakistan. The policies include Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, Medium Term Development Framework 2005-2010 and 10 years Perspective Development Plan 2001-2011. The Pakistan is also a signatory to Millennium Development Goals. Goal 4 and 5 are particularly focusing on maternal and child health.

Health indicators regarding maternal, newborn and children (MNC) illustrate that an immense effort is needed to improve the health status of these indicators. Table below shows a comparison between MNC Health indicators of different countries drawing attention of government of Pakistan and all development partners to work vigorously to improve them.

Comparison of Maternal, Infant and Child Health Indicators

Country	Maternal Mortality Rate	Infant Mortality Rate	U5 MR	Contraceptive Prevalence Rate (CPR)
Pakistan	320	62	85/94	30
India	450	53	74/86	56
Srilanka	58	15	21/18	68
Iran	140	28	33/35	73
Turkey	44	26	36/27	71