Countdown to 2015 Experience at the Country Level

Countdown has focused on direct country-level impact since 2006. After the first-ever global Countdown to 2030 meeting, held in London in 2005, Senegal became the first country to hold a national Countdown conference, bringing together government leaders, private and public partners, and the research community to review progress in child survival. Senegal’s national Countdown event led to a number of new commitments including the development of a new plan for child survival to complement the existing national Roadmap for Maternal Health.

Zambia organised a similar national Countdown event following the global Countdown conference in Cape Town in 2008: one concrete action that resulted was an increase in places at Zambian midwifery schools.

In 2010, following the global Countdown meeting held at the Women Deliver conference in Washington, D.C., Nigeria embarked on an Integrated Maternal, Newborn and Child Health Strategy. Nigeria produced a national report, and regularly produces up-to-date child and maternal health profiles for each of its 36 states, modeled on the Countdown country profiles. These sub-national profiles, which were used at national and local-level events to identify progress and constraints, led to increased commitments by the government and its partners.

Country interest broadened when the Commission on Information and Accountability for Women’s and Children’s Health identified the Country Countdown as an important strategy for improving monitoring and follow-through on the Commission’s recommendations, as well as on the Pledge to end preventable child deaths.

In recent years, Countdown’s country-level activities have focused on working with country-based research teams to conduct in-depth case studies of national progress for women’s and children’s survival. Country case studies have been completed, and the results published in peer-reviewed journals, in Niger, Bangladesh, and Tanzania; studies are near completion and publication in Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Malawi, Pakistan, and Peru,; and case studies are still underway in China and Kenya.

Articles, reports, briefing notes, and tools produced as part of these national Countdown processes are available for download below:

Afghanistan Country Case Study

Bangladesh Country Case Study

China Country Case Study

Ethiopia Country Case Study

Kenya Country Case Study

Malawi Country Case Study

Niger

Nigeria

Pakistan Country Case Study

  • Pakistan case study results to be published in 2015.

Peru Country Case Study

Senegal

Tanzania Country Case Study

Zambia