Drowning kills 372,000 people each year: UN

A newly-released World Health Organisation (WHO) report shows that drowning claims the lives of 372,000 people each year, UN deputy spokesperson Farhan Haq said Monday.

The WHO Monday released the global report on drowning: Preventing a leading killer, which reveals that drowning kills more than 40 people every hour and is among the 10 leading causes of death for children and young people in every region, Xinhua reported.

Haq said at a daily briefing that the report calls for a substantial scaling-up of efforts and resources to prevent drowning and outlines several actions to be taken by both national policy-makers and local communities.

"It also draws attention to the need to make drowning prevention an integral part of a number of current debates, such as climate change which leads to increased flooding; mass migrations, including of asylum seekers travelling by boat; and issues such as rural development and water and sanitation," he added.