DETERMENANTS OF INFANT DEATHS IN ETHIOPIA: APPLICATION OF COUNT REGRESSION MODELS

Abstract

Infant mortality is defined as the death of a child before the age of one, and it is quantified by the infant mortality rate (IMR). About 4.1 million children worldwide lost their lives in their first year of life in 2018. One of the sustainable development goals is to lower infant mortality to 12 deaths for every 1000 live births by 2030. Studying the factors that contribute to infant mortality is crucial for lowering the rate. Based on the 2019 Ethiopian demographic health census, this study sought to determine the determinant factor of infant mortality per mother. In this study the outcome variable is the number of infant deaths per mother. The survey (2019 EDHS) collected information from total of 8,855 women with the age of 15-49. Out of this we considered 5,679 women in this study which are gave live birth in their life time. Out of the considered women 1,191(20.98%) was experienced one and more infant deaths. Model compression was done using AIC, BIC, likelihood ratio test and Vuong test. HNB regression model was found to be the best model to fit the data. The result showed that the variable: - wealth index, preceding birth interval, Region, Place of delivery, Birth order and antenatal care visit had significant factors on infant mortality. The poorer wealth index (IRR=0.736; 95% CI: 0.548, 0.990), preceding birth interval month (IRR=0.744; 95%CI: 0.580, 0.955), infant who born in health facility (IRR=0.777; 95%CI: 0.614, 0.984), birth order (IRR=0.847; 95%CI: 0.792, 0.906), number of antenatal care 5-8 visit (IRR=0.685; 95% CI: 0.476, 0.986) were associated with reduced incidence of infant mortality controlling for other variables in the model. Whereas, being a resident of the Somali and Dire Dawa region (IRR=2.320; 95%CI: 1.022, 5.269) and (IRR=2.402; 95%CI: 1.024, 5.633) respectively were associated with an increased incidence of infant mortality. The implication of this study is that government and other stakeholders should be increasing access of health facility nearest to the community in all regions, encouraging utilization of antenatal care visit and encouraging mothers born in health facility to achieve sustainable development goals.