We read a lot about insuring our own lives or the lives of our spouses. What about the lives of our children? These youngsters are so precious to us and unfortunately, many of them pass away each year. Should we insure their lives to help pay for their funeral and burial expenses or is this a waste of money? Unfortunately, many families have realised that it would be money well-spent.
Alarming Child Mortality Statistics
According to a recent article in The Guardian, death rates for British children are “a major crisis.” Every day, five children in Britain die unnecessarily from pneumonia, meningitis, asthma, and other conditions that are not property treated because NHS care for youngsters is inadequate and poorly organized, says the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, a leader of 11,000 UK child health specialists.
Two thousand young lives are lost each year, causing the UK to have some of the worst death rates for children to age 14 within Europe
Experts say that sick children in the UK have greater risk of dying due to lack of paediatric skills possessed by some general practitioners, lack of expertise in small paediatric units, and a shortage of consultants. According to the Royal College, the lack of senior-level paediatricians is so severe that every unit cannot guarantee safety of treatment.
The college is fighting for major changes in the NHS treatment of children, calling for centralised hospital services to reduce the number of preventable deaths. Sweden is being promoted as one model of effective healthcare for children.
The 2012 mortality database of the World Health Organisation (WHO) reflected that, of 14 nations, the UK had the highest proportion by far of “yearly excess child deaths compared with Sweden.” Nearly 2,000 of the 6,198 deaths occurred in this region, more than two times the number of deaths in France and more than all other included countries of a similar size.
Hilary Cass, a consultant paediatrician at Evelina hospital for children in London, noted that children are the future and said, “we should do so much better.”
Calling for Improved Child Healthcare
Tough some of these children experience several congenital abnormalities from birth, a large portion are considered “healthcare amenable.” This means that better treatment would have prevented the children from dying. Among zero to 14-year-olds in eight European nations, the UK had the worst mortality rate due to asthma and the fourth worst of 15 countries for death from pneumonia, according to the WHO. Only three percent of asthmatic children have personal care plans.
By failing to change the organisation and delivery of healthcare services for children, the UK has achieved the worst child mortality in Europe. Until this situation is addressed, parents should consider insuring the lives of their children. Losing a child is very difficult and struggling to pay for a decent funeral and burial makes things much worse.
In the meantime, politicians and healthcare advocates are calling on all relevant organisations to work together to improve the health of UK children by delivering more and better care. Each child deserves an equal chance of living a healthy life.
