Global deaths of newborn babies remain alarmingly high, particularly among the world’s poorest countries.

UNICEF today said that babies born in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore have a high chance at survival while newborn deaths in Kiribati, Papua New Guinea and Federated States of Micronesia remain alarmingly high.

Executive Director Henrietta Fore says while they have more than halved the number of deaths among children under the age of five in the last quarter century, they have not made similar progress in ending deaths among children less than one month old.

Fore says given that the majority of these deaths are preventable, clearly they are failing the world’s poorest babies.

In the report, it says that in low-income countries, the average newborn mortality rate is 27 deaths per 1,000 births while in high-income countries, that rate is 3 deaths per 1,000.

In Kiribati, one in every fort-four babies does not survive, in the Federated States of Micronesia one in fifty-eight and in Vanuatu, one in eighty-five do not survive.

UNICEF Pacific Representative Sheldon Yett says the newborn mortality rates throughout the Pacific remains as a serious concern.

Yett says they are working with governments around the region to improve the quality of care for newborn babies and to ensure that all babies, no matter where they are born, receive the vital care they need in those few days to survive.