Child deaths fell below 7 million last year

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The number of children under the age of five who die annually fell to less than 7 million in 2011, but around 19,000 boys and girls around the world are still dying every day from largely preventable causes, the U.N. children’s agency said in a report released Wednesday night.

The report by the United Nations Children’s Fund said that four-fifths of under-five deaths last year occurred in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. More than half the pneumonia and diarrhea deaths — which together account for almost 30 percent of under-five deaths worldwide — occur in just four countries: Congo, India, Nigeria and Pakistan, it said.