19 of the 20 countries worldwide with the highest number of children under the age of five dying per 1,000 live births were found in Sub-Saharan Africa, with Niger, Nigeria, and Somalia topping the list. This made it the world region with the significantly highest child mortality rate in 2022.

The average for 2022 based on 187 countries was 27 deaths per 1000 births. The highest value was in Niger: 121 deaths per 1000 births and the lowest value was in Estonia: 2 deaths per 1000 births. The indicator is available from 1960 to 2022. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.

This statistic shows the 20 countries* with the highest infant mortality rate in 2024. An estimated 101.3 infants per 1,000 live births died in the first year of life in Afghanistan in 2024. Infant and child mortality Infant mortality usually refers to the death of children younger than one year. Child mortality, which is often used synonymously with infant mortality, is the death of children younger than five. Among the main causes are pneumonia, diarrhea – which causes dehydration – and infections in newborns, with malnutrition also posing a severe problem. As can be seen above, most countries with a high infant mortality rate are developing countries or emerging countries, most of which are located in Africa. Good health care and hygiene are crucial in reducing child mortality; among the countries with the lowest infant mortality rate are exclusively developed countries, whose inhabitants usually have access to clean water and comprehensive health care. Access to vaccinations, antibiotics and a balanced nutrition also help reducing child mortality in these regions. In some countries, infants are killed if they turn out to be of a certain gender. India, for example, is known as a country where a lot of girls are aborted or killed right after birth, as they are considered to be too expensive for poorer families, who traditionally have to pay a costly dowry on the girl’s wedding day. Interestingly, the global mortality rate among boys is higher than that for girls, which could be due to the fact that more male infants are actually born than female ones. Other theories include a stronger immune system in girls, or more premature births among boys.

In 2021, Niger had the highest mortality rate among children aged under five years, with an average of around 115 children dying, per one thousand live births, under five years of age. This statistic shows the countries with the highest mortality rate among children aged under five years as of 2021.

Since the millennium, the global child mortality rate decreased steadily, even though the curve flattened more through the 2010s. This is explained by increasing vaccinations, improved nutrition, and better access to antibiotics. Moreover, research shows that child mortality decreases when women are more educated. However, further investments in child health programs and education for women are required to continue to reduce global child mortality.

UNICEF's country profile for India, including under-five mortality rates, child health, education and sanitation data.

Historical chart and dataset showing World infant mortality rate by year from 1950 to 2025.

Vietnam Child Mortality Rate: Under Five: Deaths per 1000 Live Births: Total data was reported at 21.500 NA in 2017. This records a decrease from the previous number of 21.800 NA for 2016. Vietnam Child Mortality Rate: Under Five: Deaths per 1000 Live Births: Total data is updated yearly, averaging 23.800 NA from Dec 2001 (Median) to 2017, with 17 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 45.300 NA in 2001 and a record low of 21.500 NA in 2017. Vietnam Child Mortality Rate: Under Five: Deaths per 1000 Live Births: Total data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by General Statistics Office. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Vietnam – Table VN.G058: Vital Statistics.

This statistic shows the 20 countries * with the lowest infant mortality rate in 2024. An estimated 1.5 out of 1,000 live births died in the first year of life in Slovenia and Singapore in 2024. Infant mortality Infant mortality rates are often used as an indicator of the health and well-being of a nation. Monaco, Iceland, and Japan are among the top three countries with the lowest infant mortality rates with around 2 infant deaths per 1,000 infants within their first year of life. Generally, the countries with the lowest infant mortality also have some of the highest average life expectancy figures. Additionally, the countries with the highest density of physicians and doctors also generally report low infant mortality. Yet, many different factors contribute to differing rates, including the overall income of a country, health spending per capita, a mother’s level of education, environmental conditions, and medical infrastructure, to name a few. This creates a lot of variation concerning the level of childbirth and infant care around the world. The countries with the highest rates of infant mortality include Afghanistan, Mali, and Somalia. These countries experience around 100 infant deaths per 1,000 infants in their first year of life. While the reasons for high rates of infant mortality are numerous, the leading causes of death for children under the year five around the world are Pneumonia, Diarrhea, and Prematurity.

The average for 2022 based on 44 countries was 4 deaths per 1000 births. The highest value was in Moldova: 14 deaths per 1000 births and the lowest value was in Estonia: 2 deaths per 1000 births. The indicator is available from 1960 to 2022. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.

UNICEF's country profile for France, including under-five mortality rates, child health, education and sanitation data.

The number of deaths of children under the age of five. The data is sorted by both sex and total and includes a range of values from 1955 to 2019. A birth-week cohort method is used to calculate the absolute number of deaths among neonates, infants, and children under age 5. First, each annual birth cohort is divided into 52 equal birth-week cohorts. Then each birth-week cohort is exposed throughout the first five years of life to the appropriate calendar year- and age-specific mortality rates depending on cohort age. All deaths from birth-week cohorts occurring as a result of exposure to the mortality rate for a given calendar year are allocated to that year and are summed by age group at death to get the total number of deaths for a given year and age group. The annual estimate of the number of live births in each country comes from the World Population Prospects. This data is sourced from the UN Inter-Agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation. The UN IGME uses the same estimation method across all countries to arrive at a smooth trend curve of age-specific mortality rates. The estimates are based on high quality nationally representative data including statistics from civil registration systems, results from household surveys, and censuses. The child mortality estimates are produced in conjunction with national level agencies such as a country’s Ministry of Health, National Statistics Office, or other relevant agencies.

UNICEF's country profile for Central African Republic, including under-five mortality rates, child health, education and sanitation data.

UNICEF's country profile for Senegal, including under-five mortality rates, child health, education and sanitation data.

The average for 2022 based on 53 countries was 7 deaths per 1000 births. The highest value was in Niger: 20 deaths per 1000 births and the lowest value was in Algeria: 1 deaths per 1000 births. The indicator is available from 1990 to 2022. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.

Vietnam Child Mortality Rate: Under Five: Deaths per 1000 Live Births: Rural data was reported at 26.000 NA in 2017. This records a decrease from the previous number of 26.400 NA for 2016. Vietnam Child Mortality Rate: Under Five: Deaths per 1000 Live Births: Rural data is updated yearly, averaging 27.500 NA from Dec 2001 (Median) to 2017, with 17 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 50.100 NA in 2001 and a record low of 22.500 NA in 2008. Vietnam Child Mortality Rate: Under Five: Deaths per 1000 Live Births: Rural data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by General Statistics Office. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Vietnam – Table VN.G058: Vital Statistics.

BackgroundDespite the sharp decline in global under-5 deaths since 1990, uneven progress has been achieved across and within countries. In sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for child mortality were met only by a few countries. Valid concerns exist as to whether the region would meet new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for under-5 mortality. We therefore examine further sources of variation by assessing age patterns, trends, and forecasts of mortality rates.Methods and findingsData came from 106 nationally representative Demographic and Health Surveys (DHSs) with full birth histories from 31 SSA countries from 1990 to 2017 (a total of 524 country-years of data). We assessed the distribution of age at death through the following new demographic analyses. First, we used a direct method and full birth histories to estimate under-5 mortality rates (U5MRs) on a monthly basis. Second, we smoothed raw estimates of death rates by age and time by using a two-dimensional P-Spline approach. Third, a variant of the Lee–Carter (LC) model, designed for populations with limited data, was used to fit and forecast age profiles of mortality. We used mortality estimates from the United Nations Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation (UN IGME) to adjust, validate, and minimize the risk of bias in survival, truncation, and recall in mortality estimation. Our mortality model revealed substantive declines of death rates at every age in most countries but with notable differences in the age patterns over time. U5MRs declined from 3.3% (annual rate of reduction [ARR] 0.1%) in Lesotho to 76.4% (ARR 5.2%) in Malawi, and the pace of decline was faster on average (ARR 3.2%) than that observed for infant (IMRs) (ARR 2.7%) and neonatal (NMRs) (ARR 2.0%) mortality rates. We predict that 5 countries (Kenya, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda) are on track to achieve the under-5 sustainable development target by 2030 (25 deaths per 1,000 live births), but only Rwanda and Tanzania would meet both the neonatal (12 deaths per 1,000 live births) and under-5 targets simultaneously. Our predicted NMRs and U5MRs were in line with those estimated by the UN IGME by 2030 and 2050 (they overlapped in 27/31 countries for NMRs and 22 for U5MRs) and by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) by 2030 (26/31 and 23/31, respectively). This study has a number of limitations, including poor data quality issues that reflected bias in the report of births and deaths, preventing reliable estimates and predictions from a few countries.ConclusionsTo our knowledge, this study is the first to combine full birth histories and mortality estimates from external reliable sources to model age patterns of under-5 mortality across time in SSA. We demonstrate that countries with a rapid pace of mortality reduction (ARR ≥ 3.2%) across ages would be more likely to achieve the SDG mortality targets. However, the lower pace of neonatal mortality reduction would prevent most countries from achieving those targets: 2 countries would reach them by 2030, 13 between 2030 and 2050, and 13 after 2050.

Cameroon jumped by 0.1% of Child Mortality Rate in 2019, from a year earlier.

This dataset contains three CSV files documenting the relationship between log GDP and infant mortality rates for 30 countries. The data has been compiled to analyze the impact of economic status on child mortality rates. Each file includes relevant variables for conducting cross-national research on this topic.Files:Country_LogGDP.csvThis file contains the log-transformed GDP data for 30 countries.Variables:Country: The name of the country.Year: The year of the observation.LogGDP: The log-transformed value of the country's GDP for the corresponding year.Infant_Mortality.csvThis file provides the infant mortality rate data (number of infant deaths per 1,000 live births) for the same 30 countries.Variables:Country: The name of the country.Year: The year of the observation.Infant_Mortality: The infant mortality rate for the corresponding year.Average_LogGDP_InfantMortality.csvThis file contains the average log GDP and infant mortality rates for the 30 countries.Variables:Country: The name of the country.Average_LogGDP: The average log-transformed GDP for each country over the time period.Average_Infant_Mortality: The average infant mortality rate for each country over the time period.

Norway NO: Mortality Rate: Under-5: per 1000 Live Births data was reported at 2.600 Ratio in 2017. This stayed constant from the previous number of 2.600 Ratio for 2016. Norway NO: Mortality Rate: Under-5: per 1000 Live Births data is updated yearly, averaging 9.550 Ratio from Dec 1960 (Median) to 2017, with 58 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 22.600 Ratio in 1960 and a record low of 2.600 Ratio in 2017. Norway NO: Mortality Rate: Under-5: per 1000 Live Births data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Norway – Table NO.World Bank: Health Statistics. Under-five mortality rate is the probability per 1,000 that a newborn baby will die before reaching age five, if subject to age-specific mortality rates of the specified year.; ; Estimates Developed by the UN Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation (UNICEF, WHO, World Bank, UN DESA Population Division) at www.childmortality.org.; Weighted average; Given that data on the incidence and prevalence of diseases are frequently unavailable, mortality rates are often used to identify vulnerable populations. Moreover, they are among the indicators most frequently used to compare socioeconomic development across countries. Under-five mortality rates are higher for boys than for girls in countries in which parental gender preferences are insignificant. Under-five mortality captures the effect of gender discrimination better than infant mortality does, as malnutrition and medical interventions have more significant impacts to this age group. Where female under-five mortality is higher, girls are likely to have less access to resources than boys.