Socio-economic determinants of under-five mortality in urban and rural areas in Tanzania

Sammanfattning: Under-five mortality in rural and urban areas in Tanzania is of critical national concern as is also the case in other developing countries. Within Tanzania, mortality rates vary greatly by region, with some regions having much higher mortality rates than others. The government of Tanzania has made substantial progress in reducing the under-five mortality rate. Despite the strategies introduced by the Government to reduce the under-five mortality rate, the rate is still higher in rural areas than urban areas. The main objective of this study is to determine which socioeconomic and environmental factors influence under-five mortality in rural and urban areas. Binary Logistic Regression is used for this analysis. Results from this study show that aged of mothers older than 40years, working mothers, birth interval, unimproved sources of water and mothers who never breastfeeding has significant impact on the probability of death in both urban and rural areas. The study recomended that Tanzania would benefit from educational campaigns on breastfeeding, child spacing and family planning.