Infant mortality in Kiribati was 46 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2011, with an under-five mortality rate of 60 deaths per 1,000 live births. As shown in Graph 1, there has been a consistent decline in the under-five mortality rate since 1990. Although this decline is encouraging, the under-five mortality rate is not yet in line with the country’s target of 31 deaths per 1,000 live births, as defined by Millennium Development Goal 4 (MDG 4). In 2010 the three most prominent causes of death for children below the age of five years were prematurity (23 per cent), pneumonia (20 per cent) and birth asphyxia (11 per cent). Other contributory causes were diarrhoea (nine per cent) and congenital anomalies and injuries (both eight per cent). In the period 2006-10 Kiribati had a reported maternal mortality ratio of 56 deaths per 100,000 live births.
