World Pneumonia Day 2025
The theme for World Pneumonia Day 2025 is Child Survival as pneumonia is the single biggest infectious killer of newborns and children – claiming the lives of 610,000 children under five, including 186,000 in the newborn period, in 2023 according to the Global Burden of Disease.
We are delighted to highlight organizations working together to reduce pneumonia deaths among newborns and children as their success will help countries achieve the Sustainable Development Goals for both newborn and child survival (SDG 3.2) by the 2030 deadline
Currently, more than 60 countries are not on track to achieve the neonatal target (12 newborn deaths for every 1,000 babies born) and more than 50 countries are off-track to achieve the post-neonatal target (13 deaths among children aged 1-59 months for every 1,000 children aged 28 days).
To achieve these targets, newborn pneumonia deaths need to fall from 186,000 to 122,000 and child pneumonia deaths need to fall from 610,000 per year to 400,000 by 2030.
Highlights from World Pneumonia Day 2025 included the following activities, and more listed below!
- 5th Global Conference for World Pneumonia Day with the theme “Enhancing Diagnosis, Managing Oxygen Needs, and Tackling Antibiotic Resistance”
- Launch of Nigeria’s first Child Survival Action Plan by the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare
- Why fighting pneumonia is key to child survival, Child Survival Action
- Bangladesh celebrates World Pneumonia Day with the Child Health Research Foundation!
- Pneumococcal Vaccine (PCV) Scorecard, which shows the 20 countries where increases in PCV can save the most children’s lives
- New VIEWHub module on Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) vaccination
- Pneumonia Care Seeking Scorecard, which highlights the countries where more than 50% of children with pneumonia symptoms are NOT take for health care
- New study to collect X-ray and ultrasound images from adults and children with pneumonia and/or TB to develop AI algorithms by Qure.ai and the Gates Foundation
- Launch of the first ever CSO Coalitions for Medical Oxygen Access in Zambia, Kenya, Malawi, and Tanzania
- World Pneumonia Day Podcast with Dr Lwimba Kauda, Anesthesiologist, Critical Care Physician, CSO Coalition for Medical Oxygen Access in Zambia
- Nurse Wey Sabi and compelling social media videos from Vaccine Network for Disease Control (VNDC) in Nigeria
RESOURCES
Articles
- International Pneumonia Day: improving access to oxygen therapy for all, AccessOxygen, Air Liquide
- NutriVax: Integrating Nutrition and Vaccination to Save Children’s Lives in Nigeria (with video), ALIMA
- What do the new Global Burden of Disease estimates tell us about childhood pneumonia?, Every Breath Counts
- The promise of reduced dose pneumococcal vaccination for children, Every Breath Counts
- The power of civil society to support new vaccine introductions, Every Breath Counts
- Baby Lawrence’s Fight for Breath, Marking FREO2’s 30,000th Patient Treated: A World Pneumonia Day Story, FREO2 Foundation
- Study reveals the heavy emotional toll of having a baby hospitalised with RSV, Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance
- Pneumonia Warning Signs: How 300 Parents Learned to Check Oxygen Levels in Nigeria, HealthPort Nigeria
- 11.7 million children vaccinated in Africa countries thanks to the Alliance for Childhood Immunization, “la Caixa” Foundation
- Preventing RSV, a hidden killer of infants in low- and middle-income countries, Medicines Patent Pool
- Debunking 6 common myths about pneumonia in adults, Merck
- One step closer to protection: Setting the stage for maternal RSV vaccine introduction, PATH
- Pneumonia in children: What you need to know, UNICEF
- Building oxygen access from the ground up: an update on the East African Program on Oxygen Access, Unitaid
Peer-reviewed Journals
- Post-mortem investigation of deaths due to pneumonia in children aged 1-59 months in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia from 2016 to 2022: an observational study, Lancet Child and Adolescent Health, Child Health and Mortality Prevention Surveillance (CHAMPS)
- Evaluating the performance of an automated respiratory rate counter in detecting fast breathing pneumonia in children using a reference video expert panel, BMC Digital Health, ChARM
- Health-care burden related to respiratory syncytial virus in a resource-constrained setting: a prospective observational study, Lancet Global Health, Child Health Research Foundation (CHRF) Bangladesh
- The path to equitable respiratory syncytial virus prevention for infants: challenges and opportunities for global implementation, Lancet Global Health, Gates Foundation
- RSV-associated hospitalizations in Bangladeshi children under five: Unveiling the disease burden, Journal of Infection and Public Health, icddr,b
- Pediatric pneumonia: a call for point-of-care diagnostics and prognostics, The Lancet Global Health
- World Pneumonia Day 2025: The Global Burden of a Persistent and Preventable Threat, Springer Nature Research Communities, Catia Cilloniz
- Navigating oxygen management challenges amidst COVID-19 pandemic and beyond in India: a modified Total Interpretive Structural Modeling (m-TISM) approach, BMC Health Services Research
Initiatives
- Transforming oxygen access across nine countries, Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI)
- Pneumococcal Vaccine Scorecard, Every Breath Counts
- Pneumonia Care Seeking Scorecard, Every Breath Counts
- Pediatrician Immunization Pledge, International Pediatric Association (IPA)
- Track New RSV Products to Fight Pneumonia on VIEW-hub, International Vaccine Access Centre (IVAC) (Go straight to VIEW-hub)
- World Pneumonia Day 2025 Toolkit, VIEW-Hub by IVAC
- CSO Coalitions for Medical Oxygen Access in Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, and Zambia, PATH
- On the verge of RSV disease prevention: A communications toolkit (updated), PATH
- Project Vishwaas – Tackling Childhood Pneumonia in India, ZMQ Development
Campaigns
- Clean Air to Protect Lung Health, Air Aware Labs
- Why fighting pneumonia is key to child survival, Child Survival Action
- STOP RSV, Every Breath Counts
Events
- Bangladesh celebrates World Pneumonia Day 2025!, Child Health Research Foundation
- Launch of Nigeria’s Child Survival Action Plan, Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare
- 5th Global Conference for World Pneumonia Day, Dr Catia Cilloniz, PneumoLight, Every Breath Counts, AGEI Guatemala
- Presentation, Dr Keith Klugman, Gates Foundation
- Debate on Pneumonia Vaccination, National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), South Africa
Videos
- New Clinical Practice Guideline on Pneumonia in Adults, Dr Julio Ramirez, American Thoracic Society
- Supporting FREO2 to deliver oxygen support in 131 health facilities across three countries, Grand Challenges Canada
- World Pneumonia Day 2025: Your guide to beat the deadly disease, Guardian Nigeria
- L’Espoir Dans Un Flacon (Hope in a Vial), Introducing PCV, rotavirus, and malaria vaccines in Chad, Niyel
- Amoxicillin DT and combatting childhood pneumonia in Tanzania: Q&A with Chief Pharmacist Daudi Msasi, Results for Development
- 100 Oxygen Plants and Counting, UNICEF
- Vayu Bubble CPAP in Kenya, Unitaid
- Breath of Hope, Vayu Bubble CPAP in Kakuma Refugee Camp, Vayu Global Health
- World Pneumonia Day message from Nurse Wey Sabi and compelling social media videos from Vaccine Network for Disease Control (VMDC), Nigeria
Press Releases
- Pneumonia Remains Leading Cause of Child Mortality, Forum of International Respiratory Societies Calls for Immediate Action to Prevent Childhood Pneumonia on World Pneumonia Day 2025, American Thoracic Society (ATS) and Forum of International Respiratory Societies (FIRS)
Media
- Why are we still losing children to pneumonia? Daily Nation, Kenya
- Prematurity, pneumonia claim 442,000 children annually — Minister, PUNCH, Nigeria
- World Pneumonia Day: Union Health Minister J.P. Nadda Reaffirms Commitment to Protect Every Child from Pneumonia, Akashvani, India
- Lung protection: Preventing pneumonia in the young and elderly, China Global Television Network, China
- Pneumonia among top killers in the Philippines, Daily Tribune, The
Philippines - Campaign Urges Universal PCV Access for Thai Children, Bangkok Post
Research
- BREATH Study, collecting radiologic data from adults and children in settings affected by tuberculosis and pneumonia, to populate open access databases and advance innovation in AI-automated radiologic interpretation, Qure.ai and Gates Foundation
ARTICLES
Fiji Moves First
How a Pacific vaccine innovator became the first low- or middle-income country to reduce its pneumococcal vaccine schedule from three doses to two For more than a decade, Fiji has protected its children against pneumococcal disease with three doses of pneumococcal conjugate vaccine, or PCV....
01 October, 2026
In the Ebola response, oxygen remains a lifesaving tool that is still out of reach
“To be honest we are already losing Ebola patients because we don’t have enough oxygen.” For Dr Richard Kojan, an intensive care physician with the Alliance for International Medical Action (ALIMA), some of the most painful moments of the 2026 Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak in the...
04 August, 2026
Historic Milestone: 71% of World’s Children Protected Against Pneumococcal Disease
Statement by the Secure PCV Collaborators in response to the WHO/UNICEF Estimates of National Immunization Coverage (WUENIC) More than seven in every ten infants are protected with three doses of the pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV) in 2025, according to the latest vaccine coverage estimates from...
27 July, 2026
Childhood Pneumonia Takes Center Stage at INSPiRED 2026
The 4th Congress of the International Society of Pediatric Respiratory Diseases (INSPiRED), held in Bologna in June 2026, demonstrated that we have entered a new era of pneumonia control, where rapid reductions in child mortality are within reach. Across the Congress, presentations highlighted advances in...
07 July, 2026
Financing Maternal RSV Immunization Through Reduced-Dose PCV Schedules
Pneumonia remains the leading infectious cause of death among children under five, accounting for more than 600,000 deaths annually worldwide. Despite gains in vaccine coverage, progress reducing pneumonia deaths has slowed, and many countries face increasingly constrained health budgets. At the same time, new tools...
05 June, 2026
The power of civil society to support new vaccine introductions
Something extraordinary has been happening for the children of Chad, Somalia, and South Sudan. An unprecedented period of child health progress with the introduction of new vaccines against pneumonia, diarrhea, and malaria. Together, these three infections caused 86,000 deaths in 2021 – 45% of all...
22 June, 2025
