Society · Under-five mortality · Ethiopia
Ethiopia’s under-five mortality fell to 44.5 per 1,000 live births in 2024.
44.5 per 1,000 live births
2024
Down 7 per 1,000 live births from 2023.
Updated 18 Oct 2026
In plain words
44.5 per 1,000 live births
What it is. Under-five mortality is the probability that a child born alive dies before reaching the age of five, expressed per 1,000 live births. It describes the risk faced by a birth cohort, so it can be compared between years and between countries of very different sizes. Stillbirths fall outside it, and it gives no information on causes of death or on the health of children who survive.
Lower is better. Each point lower means fewer children dying before their fifth birthday, so a falling figure is good news. The latest figure, for 2024, is 44.5 per 1,000 live births, down from 51.5 per 1,000 live births a year earlier, a fall of 13.6 per cent. It is the lowest reading since 2015. The highest in that span was 70.4 per 1,000 live births in 2021, so the figure has dropped sharply over three years.
Why it matters. At 44.5 per 1,000 live births, a small but real share of Ethiopian families still lose a child before the age of five. The fall from 2021 suggests that more children are surviving the early years, which eases the burden on households and on the health system. The state's health budget and its programmes for childbirth care and vaccination are where further gains would have to come from.
| Period | Under-five mortality · Ethiopia |
|---|---|
| 2015 | 64.4 per 1,000 live births |
| 2016 | 61.3 per 1,000 live births |
| 2017 | 58.4 per 1,000 live births |
| 2018 | 55.8 per 1,000 live births |
| 2019 | 53.6 per 1,000 live births |
| 2020 | 51.5 per 1,000 live births |
| 2021 | 70.4 per 1,000 live births |
| 2022 | 68.1 per 1,000 live births |
| 2023 | 51.5 per 1,000 live births |
| 2024 | 44.5 per 1,000 live births |
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0) · Licence: CC BY 4.0
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Strata-AF™ Data, Under-five mortality, Ethiopia, 2024; source World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0), retrieved 18 Oct 2026; https://data.strata-af.com/society/under-five-mortality/ethiopia
Data insights · Worked out from the published figures
What this means
Working this out from the published figures…
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Methodology
Probability of dying before the age of five, per 1,000 live births. Unit: per 1,000 live births.
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (series SH.DYN.MORT), retrieved through the World Bank API and published under CC BY 4.0. Updated annually; the World Bank's own source notes apply.