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Mothers and Children:
Make Them Count

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Caring for her children's health is every mother's most important responsibility. Simple practices such as exclusive breastfeeding and adequate hygiene are essential to ensuring infant health. Support from fathers is critical, too.

But women also need help from health workers to be good mothers. One of the most important public health tools for ensuring child health is immunization. The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) has worked with countries throughout the region to increase immunization rates.This year, all 35 PAHO member countries participated in Vaccination Week in the Americas, April 23–30, which focused on getting vaccines to children in hard-to-reach areas with traditionally low coverage.

Another key tool for improving child health is the Integrated Management of Childhood Illness (IMCI) strategy.Ministries of health throughout the Americas are using IMCI to fight the most common causes of childhood illness and death, including diarrhea, respiratory infections, and diseases associated with nutritional deficiencies.The strategy lays out key family and community health practices to empower women, families, and communities to work together to improve child health.The strategy has already saved thousands of lives throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. The challenge now is to scale up implementation of IMCI and extend its benefits to the remotest corners of every country in the Americas.