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.

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.

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

World infant mortality rate for 2025 is 24.99, a 2.09% decline from 2024.

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<li>World infant mortality rate for 2024 was <strong>25.52</strong>, a <strong>5.83% decline</strong> from 2023.</li>
<li>World infant mortality rate for 2023 was <strong>27.10</strong>, a <strong>3.21% decline</strong> from 2022.</li>
<li>World infant mortality rate for 2022 was <strong>28.00</strong>, a <strong>0.36% decline</strong> from 2021.</li>
</ul>Infant mortality rate is the number of infants dying before reaching one year of age, per 1,000 live births in a given year.

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.

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

The USA: Deaths of male children under five years of age per 1000 live births: The latest value from 2022 is 7 deaths per 1000 births, unchanged from 7 deaths per 1000 births in 2021. In comparison, the world average is 27 deaths per 1000 births, based on data from 187 countries. Historically, the average for the USA from 1960 to 2022 is 15 deaths per 1000 births. The minimum value, 7 deaths per 1000 births, was reached in 2015 while the maximum of 34 deaths per 1000 births was recorded in 1960.

United States US: Mortality Rate: Infant: Male: per 1000 Live Births data was reported at 6.000 Ratio in 2017. This records a decrease from the previous number of 6.200 Ratio for 2015. United States US: Mortality Rate: Infant: Male: per 1000 Live Births data is updated yearly, averaging 6.800 Ratio from Dec 1990 (Median) to 2017, with 5 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 10.400 Ratio in 1990 and a record low of 6.000 Ratio in 2017. United States US: Mortality Rate: Infant: Male: per 1000 Live Births data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.World Bank.WDI: Health Statistics. Infant mortality rate, male is the number of male infants dying before reaching one year of age, per 1,000 male live births in a given 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.

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 Türkiye, including under-five mortality rates, child health, education and sanitation data.

Belarus BY: Mortality Rate: Infant: per 1000 Live Births data was reported at 1.900 Ratio in 2023. This records a decrease from the previous number of 2.000 Ratio for 2022. Belarus BY: Mortality Rate: Infant: per 1000 Live Births data is updated yearly, averaging 12.350 Ratio from Dec 1960 (Median) to 2023, with 64 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 36.900 Ratio in 1960 and a record low of 1.900 Ratio in 2023. Belarus BY: Mortality Rate: Infant: per 1000 Live Births data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s Belarus – Table BY.World Bank.WDI: Social: Health Statistics. Infant mortality rate is the number of infants dying before reaching one year of age, per 1,000 live births in a given 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. Aggregate data for LIC, UMC, LMC, HIC are computed based on the groupings for the World Bank fiscal year in which the data was released by the UN Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation.

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.

The child mortality rate in Africa has steadily declined over the past seven decades. Between 1950 and 1955, child mortality was estimated at 311 deaths per thousand births, meaning that almost one third of all children born in these years did not make it to their fifth birthday. By 2020, this number has fallen significantly, to an estimated 71 deaths per thousand births in 2020. While the reduction rate varies on a country-by-country basis, the overall decline can be attributed in large part to the expansion of healthcare services, improvements in nutrition and access to clean drinking water, and the implementation of large scale immunization campaigns across the continent. The temporary slowdown in the 1990s has been attributed in part to rapid urbanization of many parts of the continent that coincided with poor economic performance, resulting in the creation of overcrowded slums with poor access to health and sanitation services. Despite significant improvements in the continent-wide averages, there remains a significant imbalance in the continent, with Sub-Saharan countries experiencing much higher child mortality rates than those in North Africa.

The average for 2022 based on 12 countries was 14 deaths per 1000 births. The highest value was in Guyana: 23 deaths per 1000 births and the lowest value was in Chile: 6 deaths per 1000 births. The indicator is available from 1960 to 2022. Below is a chart for all countries where data are available.

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

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

India infant mortality rate for 2025 is 24.98, a 3.18% decline from 2024.

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<li>India infant mortality rate for 2024 was <strong>25.80</strong>, a <strong>3.08% decline</strong> from 2023.</li>
<li>India infant mortality rate for 2023 was <strong>26.62</strong>, a <strong>3.89% decline</strong> from 2022.</li>
<li>India infant mortality rate for 2022 was <strong>27.70</strong>, a <strong>3.74% decline</strong> from 2021.</li>
</ul>Infant mortality rate is the number of infants dying before reaching one year of age, per 1,000 live births in a given year.

Monitoring development indicators has become a central interest of international agencies and countries for tracking progress towards the Millennium Development Goals. In this review, which also provides an introduction to a collection of articles, we describe the methodology used by the United Nations Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation to track country-specific changes in the key indicator for Millennium Development Goal 4 (MDG 4), the decline of the under-five mortality rate (the probability of dying between birth and age five, also denoted in the literature as U5MR and 5q0). We review how relevant data from civil registration, sample registration, population censuses, and household surveys are compiled and assessed for United Nations member states, and how time series regression models are fitted to all points of acceptable quality to establish the trends in U5MR from which infant and neonatal mortality rates are generally derived. The application of this methodology indicates that, between 1990 and 2010, the global U5MR fell from 88 to 57 deaths per 1,000 live births, and the annual number of under-five deaths fell from 12.0 to 7.6 million. Although the annual rate of reduction in the U5MR accelerated from 1.9% for the period 1990–2000 to 2.5% for the period 2000–2010, it remains well below the 4.4% annual rate of reduction required to achieve the MDG 4 goal of a two-thirds reduction in U5MR from its 1990 value by 2015. Thus, despite progress in reducing child mortality worldwide, and an encouraging increase in the pace of decline over the last two decades, MDG 4 will not be met without greatly increasing efforts to reduce child deaths.

This dataset provides estimates of neonatal, postneonatal, childhood, and under-5 mortality between 1990 and 2011.

US: Mortality Rate: Infant: Female: per 1000 Live Births data was reported at 5.000 Ratio in 2017. This records a decrease from the previous number of 5.200 Ratio for 2015. US: Mortality Rate: Infant: Female: per 1000 Live Births data is updated yearly, averaging 5.700 Ratio from Dec 1990 (Median) to 2017, with 5 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 8.300 Ratio in 1990 and a record low of 5.000 Ratio in 2017. US: Mortality Rate: Infant: Female: per 1000 Live Births data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by World Bank. The data is categorized under Global Database’s USA – Table US.World Bank: Health Statistics. Infant mortality rate, female is the number of female infants dying before reaching one year of age, per 1,000 female live births in a given 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.