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Abidjan (AFP)

The infant mortality rate in Ivory Coast has halved in 20 years, the planning and development minister said Monday, pointing to better and more accessible health care.

Niale Kaba said the probability of an infant dying before turning one had dropped from 112 for every 1,000 births in 1998 to 60 per 1,000 in 2016.

"The mortality rate for under fives also fell from 125 per 1,000 to 96 per 1,000 during the same period," Kaba said.

"These key results show an increasing improvement in several social indicators related to access to health care, education, and treatment for ailing children and women," she said.

However in a recent report, the UN children's agency, UNICEF, singled out Ivory Coast over neonatal deaths, saying it had one of the world's highest rates in 2016 with one baby in 27 dying in the first month of life.

The corresponding rate for Japan in the same period was one out of 1,000.

© 2018 AFP