oa Editorial from Editorial-in-Chief [Kangaroo Mother Care: a Paradigm of a Wise and Humanitarian Solution to a Limiting Situation in Developing Countries (Editor-in-Chief: Jose M. Belizan)]

The editor of the CWHR has the great pleasure to provide the readers and the medical community with an outstanding issue summarizing one of the most compelling interventions to save newborn lives in the world. This issue is being published at the same time that an updated review of the Cochrane Library provides evidence-based, conclusive support regarding the impact of the kangaroo mother care (KMC) intervention on neonatal survival [1]. The history of the development of KMC is well summarized by the editors of this issue, Drs. Ruiz and Charpak, exceptional pioneers and promoters of this intervention. In 1978, Edgar Rey [2] proposed and developed kangaroo mother care at Instituto Materno- Infantil in Santa Fe de Bogota, Colombia, as an alternative to the conventional contemporary method of care for low birth weight (LBW) infants. KMC was initially conceived to address a lack of incubators, high rates of nosocomial infections, and infant abandonment in the local hospital. The term KMC is derived from similarities to marsupial caregiving. The mothers are used as “incubators” to maintain the infants' body temperatures and to serve as the main source of food and stimulation for LBW infants until such time as they have matured enough to face extrauterine life in conditions similar to those born at term [1, 2]. Dr. Edgar Rey Sanabria passed away in 1992. From this original proposal, many studies have been conducted in low-middle- and high-income countries, all of which have concluded that KMC, when compared with conventional neonatal care, is associated with a reduction in neonatal mortality, severe infection/sepsis, hypothermia, and length of hospital stay, as well as with an increase in weight gain and exclusive or any breastfeeding [1]. Results shows consistency that neonatal deaths can be reduced by about 40% and that approximately 40 infants need to be treated to avoid one death. Kangaroo Mother Care should be widely and strongly recommended for use primarily in low- and middle-income countries. It is desirable to stimulate the creation of a leading KMC initiative advocating for the use of the intervention and providing support and training to those willing to implement it, thus building a repository of world experiences on the use of KMC and supporting, orienting, and stimulating research needed on this intervention. The spread of the use of this intervention at all levels of care would result in a significant impact on a reduction in global neonatal deaths.