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As a physician-researcher specializing in infections in newborns, Tobi Kollmann is laser focused on how to stop babies from dying. While mortality for kids under five years old has dropped substantially in recent decades, he says, there has been little improvement in the rate of deaths in the first week of life. Indeed, of the 5.2 million children under 5 years old the World Health Organization estimates died last year of preventable or treatable causes, nearly half—2.4 million—died before reaching four weeks of age, and most newborn deaths occurred in the first week after birth. Having spent time in African countries where neonatal mortality is common and witnessed the frustration of colleagues there with their limited options for preventing it, Kollmann, now at the Telethon Kids Institute in Perth, Australia, says he wanted to find solutions that could be implemented immediately.
So when ...
