DUSHANBE, January 15, Asia-Plus — The Ministry of Health (MoH) today made a statement regarding death of a number of newborn babies at the Dushanbe maternity houses.
Health Minister Rano Abdurahmonova told a news conference in Dushanbe yesterday evening that the ministry had set up a special commission to check facts given in an article published in the Dushanbe weekly Asia-Plus about death of newborn babies at maternity houses because of disruption of electricity supplies.
“Inspection of maternity houses has established that indeed, one newborn baby died at maternity house # 1 and one newborn baby died at maternity house # 3,” said the minister, “However, they died not because of disruption of electricity supplies to the maternity houses; babies’ condition was hopeless.”
“The babies were extremely premature,” said Ms. Abdurahmonova, “Thus, one of the dead babies weighed only 900 grams and the other one weighed only one kilogram.” “Such babies survive very seldom. Physicians did their best to save them.”
According to a MoH, the infant mortality rate for 2007 stood at 16.2 cases per 100,000 live births. In 2006, the infant mortality in Tajikistan stood at 17.5 cases per 100,000 live births.
