Introduction: To address United Nations Millennium Develop­ment Goal 4 (MDG 4) on reducing childhood mortality by three-quarter by 2015, there is a need for better population-based data on the rates and causes of neonatal death. This study aims to identify the risk factors of neonatal mortality in Bangladesh.

Methods: The study used data from the nationally representative 2007 Bangladesh Demographic and Health Survey. The survey gathered information regarding socioeconomic, demographic, environmental and maternal and child health care of 10,996 ever married women and 6,058 children. Both bivariate and multivariate statistical analyses were used to assess the relationship between neonatal mortality and contextual factors.

Results: The prevalence of neonatal mortality was 37/1,000. The statistical analyses yielded quantitatively important and reliable estimates of neonatal death. The multivariate logistic regression analysis yielded significantly increased risk of neonatal mortality for children with mother who had no formal education, the Muslims, whose mother were adolescents age 15-19, first ranked birth and twin babies.

Conclusion: Emphasis should be given to improve female education in Bangladesh for a better chance of satisfying important factors that can improve infant survival: the quality of infant feeding, general care, household sanitation, and adequate use of preventive and curative health services.