Saving Little Lives
Of the 2.5 million newborns that die every year 80% are low-birthweight babies and 2/3 are born prematurely.
The Saving Little Lives program in Ethiopia has a goal of reducing newborn mortality by 35 %.
The program
Scaling up a bundle of effective interventions
A key intervention in the Saving Little Lives program is Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC). Despite decades of evidence supporting the positive impact of prolonged skin-to-skin care, also known as Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC), global adoption remains low, at only 5%. Ethiopia made commendable progress by increasing KMC usage to 80% in certain areas. However, they also found that too many babies died before stabilization and the initiation of KMC.
To address this, the Saving Little Lives program expanded to include sepsis prevention and management, bubble CPAP for respiratory distress, thermal care, and feeding management.
Several participating hospitals are also implementing immediate KMC (meaning KMC is started immediately after birth). New research has shown that immediate KMC can reduce mortality by another 25 % compared to traditional KMC.
Saving Little Lives in Ethiopia
Saving Little Lives is an Innovation-to-Scale program funded by the Global Financing Facility to scale up to 290 hospitals in Ethiopia, covering 1.2 million births every year.
The impact goals
Improved newborn survival
Saving Little Lives is led by the Ethiopian Ministry of Health and has been integrated into their strategic healthcare plans. From 2021 to 2024, the program was implemented in 290 hospitals using simulation-based training, on-site mentorship, and continuous quality improvement.
The Laerdal Foundation has supported seven Ethiopian PhD candidates who will document the program's impact and contribute to the body of global research about small and sick newborn care. The final results on Saving Little Lives' impact on newborn mortality is expected in 2025.
innovation-to-scale
From donorship to ownership
Saving Little Lives was selected as one of only five programs to receive the Innovation-to-Scale award from the World Bank's Global Financing Facility in 2021. Out of 320 proposals, Saving Little Lives ranked among the top two highest in terms of its potential to save lives. The program's notable score can be attributed to the strong involvement of the government and its integration into national healthcare strategies.
Integrating Safer Births innovations
The Saving Little Lives program integrates several Safer Births innovations, including NeoNatalie Live for newborn resuscitation training, NeoBeat newborn heart rate meter, Moyo fetal heart rate meter, and CarePlus Kangaroo Mother Care wrap.
The pattern for our CarePlus Kangaroo Mother Care wrap has been made available for free. Five sites in Ethiopia now produce these wraps for the Saving Little Lives program.
Photo: Principal Investigator Abiy Seifu with the locally produced KMC wrap.
