Even before the most recent conflict began, many children were highly vulnerable to disease and malnutrition. One in four children under five years of age is chronically malnourished. One in eight children die before their fifth birthday.

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Child deaths

Sweetwater - your observations are correct but could have an incorrect implication for some and accordingly I have commented below. THUS: (a) war and occupation make things WORSE and also prevent things getting BETTER: thus the "under-5 deaths per 1,000 births" was about 200 in both Syria and Iraq in 1950, shortly after racist European colonial rule ended; by 1990 it had dropped to about 50 and 44, respectively, under the Ba'athist regimes of Assad and Hussein, respectively; however with the return of Western armies and sanctions in 1990, the value for Iraq shot up within a year or so to about 120; the present value is about 16 (SIXTEEN) for Syria and 125 for Occupied Iraq (UN Population Division data) - this indeed is why Bush I, Bush II and BOTH the Clintons (Hilary and Bill) should be arraigned before the International Criminal Court; (b) Occupiers are REQUIRED by the Geneva Convention to do everything within their power to keep their Conquered subjects ALIVE - the US, UK, racist White Australia, the Coalition and NATO are grossly violating this and other International Conventions. Just imagine you took an international jet flight today and the air hostess only gave attention, food and clean water to European passengers - on the basis that non-Europeans were somehow "used to" or "deserved" no attention, no food and no potable water on the basis of their prior colonial or neo-colonial existences. 
Killing children - whether actively or passively - is the worst of crimes. Professor Peter Singer (Princeton University) is the world's foremost bioethicist and the most influential living philosopher and has stated that doctors witholding medical aid for children are just as responsible for the child's death as if they had brought it about ACTIVELY.

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