Early Years
The Gulf region has undergone tremendous transformation over the last three to four decades. In the 1960s and 1970s, countries channeled oil wealth substantially into infrastructural development, including in health and education, rapidly expanding high-impact, cost-effective programmes such as immunization, and staffing services with expatriate doctors, nurses and teachers while local capacities were still being developed. Today, the returns on investment are clear and measurable: some of the fastest rates of reduction in under-five mortality in the world; high primary-school enrolment rates; and negligible gender disparity in access to services. Under-five mortality rates (U5MRs) range from 8 per 1,000 live births in United Arab Emirates to 27 in Saudi Arabia. There has been an epidemiological transition, with the main cause of morbidity and mortality for children aged 1-18 years old shifting from infectious diseases to injuries and accidents. Maternal mortality ratios (MMRs) are below 50 per 100,000 live births in all Gulf countries. Most deliveries are supervised by a skilled birth attendant, including in Saudi Arabia, where 91 per cent of all deliveries are supervised by a skilled birth attendant, with lower levels in rural and southern regions. All Gulf countries ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child in the early or mid-1990s, and committed to give high priority to the rights of children within the framework of their national laws. A very positive recent development has been the increasing attention given to the situation of non-national children in Gulf countries, particularly those in need of urgent attention, protection and support, such as children previously trafficked for camel racing, or the tens of thousands of children brought to Saudi Arabia for street selling and begging. About one third of the Gulf population - 11 million people - is expatriate.
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