PONE-D-22-21335Prevalence, spatial distribution and determinants of Infant Mortality in Ethiopia: Findings from 2019 Ethiopian Demographic and Health SurveyPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Tamir,

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: I Don't Know

Reviewer #2: I Don't Know

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

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5. Review Comments to the Author

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Reviewer #1: The paper has issues in the presentation of the findings and linking the spatial analysis with the regression analysis to which I have identified comments, and I encourage the authors to address the substantive nature of these comments major however, considering the importance of the findings of the paper to understanding IMR in Ethiopia, I ask the authors to revisit the paper to address my comments:

Reviewer #2: REVIEWER COMMENTS

To Publisher, PLOSONE

Sept 10,2022

manuscript ID: PONE-D-22-21335

Title: Prevalence, spatial distribution, and determinants of Infant Mortality in Ethiopia: Findings from 2019 Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to review the manuscript. Here below I have attached comments here

In ABSTRACT, in the conclusion subsection, the author stated that PNC coverage in clustered regions should be devised and strengthened. However, in their study, PNC coverage was not a significant predictor of infant mortality. The authors should emphasize what they found significant in their study. Moreover. The abbreviation PNC has not been defined elsewhere in this section; therefore, it is not clear what it represents. The statement was higher than the worldwide objective and is not clear. What is the objective worldwide? An appropriate term should be a goal or a target.

The abbreviations should be expanded when used for the first time. (eg, PNC, EDHS, DHS).

In result,

¨A little beat greater than half (51.38%) of the study participants were born from poor family (Table 1) ¨. Beat should be replaced with bit; however, the statement was not written in a formal way to write the article.

The discussion section is inadequate.

In addition, there are several language and editorial issues.

Thank you

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Dr Danish Ahmad

Reviewer #2: No

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Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: Ethiopia paper review.pdf

PONE-D-22-21335R1Prevalence, spatial distribution and determinants of Infant Mortality in Ethiopia: Findings from 2019 Ethiopian Demographic and Health SurveyPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Tadesse,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Mar 17 2023 11:59PMIf you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Betregiorgis Zegeye,

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

Additional Editor Comments

Please be sure that each of the comment raised by reviewer is addressed before you submit it and also it need repeated proofing for language editing.

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #3: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #4: All comments have been addressed

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2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

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5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #3: Yes

Reviewer #4: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #3: Thank you for addressing the points which were mentioned in the previous review. The responses are satisfactory and clarify the points previously highlighted.

Reviewer #4: 1. As you know the abbreviations that come for the first time in the text should be stated completely. (ANC and PNC in abstract).

2. Are there any exclusion criteria for this survey?

3.I Recommend to use the recent literature in disscution.

4. According to the findings, it would be better that you make some recommendations at the end of discussion.

5. I recommend to clarify the findings in figure 2 in the result part, such as critical values.

6. The map and graphs are well designed.

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Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #3: No

Reviewer #4: Yes: Mehrandokht Abedini

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Prevalence, spatial distribution and determinants of Infant Mortality in Ethiopia: Findings from 2019 Ethiopian Demographic and Health Survey

PONE-D-22-21335R2

Dear Dr. Tadesse,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Betregiorgis Zegeye, 

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE