Diarrhea is the second leading killer of children worldwide, responsible for over 600,000 deaths each year. India bears a quarter of the global burden: nearly 400 children die of diarrhea each day. A highly effective treatment—zinc and oral rehydration salts (ORS)—is affordable and available, but too few children are receiving the full recommended treatment. In 2011, less than 2 percent of Indian children were receiving this lifesaving combined treatment. To address these issues, CHAI partnered with IKEA Foundation & the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation starting in 2012 in India to improve availability, access, and usage of zinc and ORS across three high-burden states in India.
Learn about the work with IKEA Foundation in one of the three states, Madhya Pradesh, where ORS coverage increased from 29 percent to 56 percent, and zinc coverage increased from less than 1 percent to 24 percent by Q1 2015.
