Dear Mrs. Ketevan Goginashvili and Mr. Paata Shavishvili,
I hope this email finds you well amid the global pandemic.
As in previous years and in accordance with the decision by the Statistical Commission and the United Nations
Economic and Social Council resolution 2006/6, UNICEF and WHO, on behalf of the UN Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation (UN IGME), conduct a joint country consultation prior to the release of the UN IGME estimates. The consultation is undertaken
to receive feedback from national government agencies on child mortality indicators.
We are pleased to share with you the new round of draft trend estimates for child mortality produced by UN IGME for your review. Please share your feedback by 30 June 2020.
In light of the ongoing and unprecedented global COVID-19 pandemic, it is crucial for the UN IGME to continue its work to monitor child survival.
While current evidence indicates the direct impact of COVID-19 on child and youth mortality to be limited, the indirect effects stemming from strained and under-resourced health systems, household income loss, and disruptions to care-seeking and preventative
interventions, among other factors, may be substantial and widespread. For this round, estimates are produced to the year 2019, which is not affected by any COVID-19 effects, however the UN IGME is assessing the impact of COVID-19 on child and youth mortality
for the year 2020 and will incorporate these effects in next round’s estimates where applicable. We will reach out later to gather information needed for that purpose. Thank you in advance for your support.
Mr. Levan Tserediani and Mr.Teimuraz Gogishvili (in copy) are the contact persons nominated to the United Nations
Statistics Division for the Sustainable Development Goals indicators in your country.
If you are no longer the focal point for the child mortality country consultation, please let us know and
share this email with your relevant colleagues responsible for this area of work.
Please find the following files either attached or at the links below:
- An Excel file with the table and graphs containing under-five, infant, and neonatal mortality estimates along with mortality for children
aged 5─14, mortality for youths aged 15─24
and sex-specific under-five and infant mortality for your review
- A PDF file with the explanatory notes for reference (explanatory notes available in
Arabic,
English,
French,
Russian,
Spanish)
- Templates for reporting new data from vital registration, censuses, or surveys
These mortality estimates are the result of the work of the UN IGME comprised of UNICEF, WHO, UN Population Division and the World Bank Group with inputs from many countries.
The UN IGME works to improve methods and enhance harmonization of child mortality estimation among United Nations agencies.
As a principle, in order to improve the country estimates, the UN IGME considers all comments supported by evidence or by new data, for which the source and method of collection are documented:
-
If you have additional or more up-to-date data from your
civil registration system, kindly provide us with the number of deaths and mid-year population both by sex and age (<1 year, 1-4, 5-9,…, 85+). For infant and neonatal mortality, we would also need the number of infant and neonatal deaths by sex and age
(in days), as well as the number of live births. An excel workbook template for reporting this information with the age groups for reference is available
here. If vital registration data have been previously shared with UNICEF, WHO or other partners,
the template containing that previously submitted data is attached to this email (UN IGME_Vital Registration data_Tabulation_Population and Deaths.xlsx).
-
If you have additional data from a
survey which asked women aged 15-49 for the date of birth for each of their children, whether the children are still alive or if deceased, and the age at death
(the full birth history) or if you have additional data from a
survey which asked women aged 15-49 years to list all their siblings, the sex of each sibling, whether each sibling is still alive, and the current age or age at death of each sibling
(sibling survival history), please provide the report and the full dataset that could be used for the calculation of mortality estimates, as well as documentation explaining the survey/census characteristics.
-
If you have a survey/census which asked women aged 15-49 for the number of children born to them and the number that are still alive (or equivalently, the number that have died)
(the summary birth history), please provide the tabulation or the dataset, as well as documentation explaining the survey/census characteristics. An excel workbook template for reporting this tabulated information is available
here
(UN IGME_Census and Survey_Tabulation.xlsx, Sheet name: Tabulation_CEB.xlsx).
-
If you have additional data from a
survey/census which collected information on the population and deaths within a household over a defined period (e.g., 12 months prior to the survey/census) by age and sex, please provide the tabulation or the dataset that could be used for the calculation
of mortality estimates, as well as documentation explaining the survey/census characteristics.
An excel workbook template for reporting this information is available
here (UN IGME_Census and Survey_Tabulation.xlsx,
Sheet name: Tabulation_Household data).
-
If you have additional data on stillbirths from the
administrative system or a survey, kindly provide the number of stillbirths, total births (i.e. stillbirths and livebirths), as well as documentation explaining the data source characteristics. An excel workbook template for reporting this information
from a vital registration system with the categories for reference is available
here (UN
IGME_Admin data_Tabulation_Stillbirths Live births and Deaths.xlsx). An excel workbook template for reporting this information from an HMIS system with the categories for reference is available
here
(UN IGME HMIS data_Tabulation_Stillbirths, Births and Deaths.xlsx).
If stillbirth data have been previously shared with UNICEF, WHO or other partners,
a workbook containing any previously submitted stillbirth data from administrative systems is attached to this email.
Please note that the closing date for comments on UN IGME child mortality estimates will be
30 June 2020. All comments should be sent to
childmortality@unicef.org
and healthstat@who.int.
Any submissions made after this date may not be considered in the final publication of country estimates.
After this consultative process, the estimation model will be rerun to incorporate any amendments to the data. For this reason, the final estimates may differ slightly
from the provisional estimates reviewed during the country consultation.
Please note that the attached estimates are confidential and should not be quoted or published. UN IGME will release the new round of estimates of child mortality
in September 2020.
Kindly confirm receipt of this email.
Best,
______________________
Danzhen You, PhD
Coordinator of the UN Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation
Data and Analytics Section | Division of Data, Analytics, Planning and Monitoring | UNICEF HQ
3 United Nations Plaza, New York, NY 10017, USA
Telephone: +1 212 326 7235
