Leading Causes of Death in Children Under Five in Kenya
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In this article
Birth-related complications, prematurity and low birth weight, pneumonia, diarrhoeal disease, malaria and malnutrition are important causes or contributors to child deaths in Kenya. The pattern differs between newborn babies and children who survive the first month of life.
The old percentages previously shown on this page should not be used as a current mortality ranking. Illness or outpatient-attendance statistics are not the same as the causes of death.
What the Kenyan health-system data reports
The Ministry of Health’s Kenya Health Sector Strategic Plan 2023–2027 gives these three leading causes for under-fives in its 2022/23 financial-year reporting, citing KHIS Tracker 2023:
| Leading cause in that reported series | Share reported |
|---|---|
| Birth asphyxia and birth trauma | 28.4% |
| Prematurity / low birth weight | 19.9% |
| Lower respiratory tract infections | 15.1% |
These percentages belong to that specific cause-of-death reporting series. They are not 2026 percentages, not the probability that an individual child will die, and not percentages of all births. They should not be extrapolated to unrecorded community deaths without a valid method.
The figures do not add to 100% because the table above shows only the first three causes, not every cause in the source.
Other major childhood causes
The Ministry’s paediatric-care guidelines, signed in October 2025, identify pneumonia, diarrhoea, malaria and malnutrition as leading problems in under-five mortality outside neonatal conditions such as prematurity.
This list is not presented as a first-to-fourth national ranking with current percentages. The importance of each cause varies with age, location, exposure and the data source.
Malnutrition can also increase vulnerability to infections. A list that treats all nutritional contribution as one isolated cause can miss the relationship between nutrition and another illness.
Why the newborn period matters
“Under five” includes newborns. Neonatal deaths occur in the first 28 days of life; they should not be excluded when discussing the whole under-five age group.
WHO’s current child-mortality factsheet identifies prematurity, events around labour and delivery, lower respiratory infections and sepsis as major neonatal causes globally. These global observations provide context, not Kenyan cause-specific percentages for 2026.
The latest overall under-five mortality estimate
UNICEF’s Kenya profile gives an estimated under-five mortality rate of 38.8 deaths per 1,000 live births for 2024, compared with 39.6 for 2023 in the same series.
This measure describes the estimated risk of dying before age five, expressed per 1,000 live births. It is not the proportion of all Kenyan children who died in a single year and it does not provide the cause of each death.
Do not combine this 2024 estimate with the 2022/23 KHIS cause percentages to calculate exact cause-specific death totals: the periods and methods are different.
Prevention and care
WHO emphasises that many under-five deaths are preventable or treatable through effective maternal and newborn care, vaccination, nutrition support and access to appropriate treatment for infections. The Ministry’s guidelines likewise stress timely, appropriate child health services.
Warning: This article explains population data, not how to diagnose an ill child. Do not wait for symptoms to resemble a leading cause on a chart before seeking professional care.
Related reading
Leading causes of death in Kenya, all ages
