Sub-Saharan Africa is the region with the highest child mortality rate in the world, a U. N. report on global child health released Tuesday says, with newborns in Sierra Leone having the lowest chances of surviving until their fifth anniversary.

The U. N. Children’s Fund released its annual report Tuesday and the statistics it has drawn up are somber. More than 26,000 children under 5 die each day on average, with Sierra Leone, Angola and Afghanistan having the worst perspective.

“The State of the World’s Children 2008” says Sierra Leone had the highest child mortality rate in 2006, with 270 deaths per 1,000 births, followed by Angola with 260 deaths per 1,000 births, and Afghanistan with 257.

The last year for which statistics are available is 2006. Nearly 9.7 million children died worldwide before their fifth birthdays that year, but most of these deaths were preventable, the report said, with causes such as diarrhea, malnutrition, unsafe water, poor hygiene, malaria, mother-to-child transmission of HIV and neonatal problems.

These are abysmal figures compared to 3 deaths per 1,000 births in the world's six best-rating countries, which included Sweden, San Marino, Liechtenstein, Iceland and Singapore.

The average rate in industrialized countries was six deaths per 1,000 births, with a 2006 worldwide rate of 72 deaths per 1,000 births.

UNICEF’s conclusion was mixed. On one hand, the agency notes that there has been significant improvement over the long term in a number of regions, with a 60 percent decrease in child mortality rates since 1960.

The report adds that the 2006 statistics mark the first time since records began when the absolute number of under-five deaths fell below 10 million to 9.7 million.

On the other hand, UNICEF Executive Director Ann Veneman said, “The loss of 9.7 million young lives each year is unacceptable, especially when many of these deaths are preventable,” as quoted by the Associated Press.

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to 28 of the 30 countries with the highest child mortality rates and has become the region of greatest concern.

What is most outrageous, the document says, is that solutions to preventing child-deaths are well known, “simple, reliable and affordable interventions with the potential to save two-thirds of the children currently at risk are readily available,” as quoted by the BBC.

These amount to such simple health care measures as vaccination, insecticide-treated bed nets and vitamin supplements, the report said.