Update on mortality in the Democratic Republic of Congo: results from a third nationwide survey.
BACKGROUND
The humanitarian crisis in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been among the world's deadliest in recent decades. We conducted our third nationwide survey to examine trends in mortality rates during a period of changing political, security, and humanitarian conditions.


METHODS
We used a 3-stage, household-based cluster sampling technique to compare east and west DRC. Sixteen east health zones and 15 west zones were selected with a probability proportional to population size. Four east zones were purposely selected to allow historical comparisons. The 20 smallest population units were sampled in each zone, 20 households in each unit. The number and distribution of households determined whether they were selected using systematic random or random walk sampling. Respondents were asked about deaths of household members during the recall period: January 2006-April 2007.


RESULTS
In all, 14,000 households were visited. The national crude mortality rate of 2.2 deaths per 1000 population per month (95% confidence interval [CI] 2.1-2.3) is almost 70% higher than that documented for DRC in the 1984 census (1.3) and is unchanged since 2004. A small but significant decrease in mortality since 2004 in the insecure east (rate ratio: 0.96, P = .026) was offset by increases in the western provinces and a transition area in the center of the country. Nonetheless, the crude mortality rate in the insecure east (2.6) remains significantly higher than in the other regions (2.0 and 2.1, respectively). Deaths from violence have declined since 2004 (rate ratio 0.7, P = .02).


CONCLUSIONS
More than 4 years after the official end of war, the crude mortality rate remains elevated across DRC. Slight but significant improvements in mortality in the insecure east coincided temporally with recent progress on security, humanitarian, and political fronts.
Coghlan
Benjamin
B
Centre for International Health, Burnet Institute, 85 Commercial Rd, Melbourne 3004, Australia. coghlan@burnet.edu.au
Ngoy
Pascal
P
Mulumba
Flavien
F
Hardy
Colleen
C
Bemo
Valerie Nkamgang
VN
Stewart
Tony
T
Lewis
Jennifer
J
Brennan
Richard J
RJ
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D002423:Cause of Death; D019352:Censuses; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D015023:Democratic Republic of the Congo / Q000453:epidemiology; D005260:Female; D005843:Geography; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009026:Mortality / Q000639:trends*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014754:Violence / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D014857:Warfare; D055815:Young Adult