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Twenty-five thousand, eight hundred (25,800) stillbirth and neonatal deaths have been recorded in Ghana in the last three years.

Senior Lecturer at School of Public Health, University of Ghana, also an Epidemiology and Disease Control Doctor of Medicine, Dr. Alexander Manu revealed this during a presentation on “Assessment of Newborn Care in Ghana” at the 10th Annual Newborn Stakeholders’ Conference held in Koforidua under the theme “Accelerating Newborn Survival and Wellbeing: Massive Scale – Up of Key Interventions for Impact”.

He said intrapartum-related causes (asphyxia), together with preterm birth and infection, account for 90 out of every 100 deaths recorded.

Dr. Alexander Manu also attributed the high stillbirth and neonatal mortality in the country to institutional challenges such as an apparent shift of interest in newborn health demonstrated by the posture of managers at various levels, poor adherence to policies and protocols, early initiation of breastfeeding, aggressive marketing and promotion of breast milk substitute, inadequate infrastructure and equipment, frequent rotation of trained personnel and many and most importantly inadequate neonatologists in the country.

Dr. Manu said there is a deficit in the number of neonatologists as data collected from 143 out of 261 districts indicates that there was only one neonatologist from 2019 to 2021.