Five Million Births.

UNICEF has estimated that there will be approximately 5 million births amidst the coronavirus pandemic in Pakistan. Reports suggest that as much as 80 percent of resources in hospitals will be occupied to meet the needs of coronavirus patients. Amongst other things, this presents a serious challenge for ensuring antenatal care for pregnant women and neonatal care after birth. Pakistan does not do very well on this front even during regular times. According to WHO and UNICEF, maternal mortality ratio of Pakistan stands around 340/100,000 live births.

The numbers are even higher in rural areas across provinces; the situation is statistically twice as bad in certain areas of Balochistan and former FATA regions now part of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province. The infant mortality rate (IMR) is a discouraging 57.2 out of 1,000 live births. There are concerns that the pandemic threatens to exacerbate the situation, as already limited medical resources are tied up with virus cases. However, there is an encouraging development where an infected woman has successfully delivered a baby in Karachi, who has...