Ensuring healthy lives and promoting the well-being for all at all ages is essential to sustainable development. Significant strides have been made in increasing life expectancy and reducing some of the common killers associated with child and maternal mortality. Major progress has been made on increasing access to clean water and sanitation, reducing malaria, tuberculosis, polio and the spread of HIV/AIDS. However, many more efforts are needed to fully eradicate a wide range of diseases and address many different persistent and emerging health issues.(UNDP)

Facts & Figures

Child health

1. 17,000 fewer children die each day than in 1990, but more than six million children still die before their fifth birthday each year
2. Since 2000, measles vaccines have averted nearly 15.6 million deaths
3. Despite determined global progress, an increasing proportion of child deaths are in sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia. Four out of every five deaths of children under age five occur in these regions.
4. Children born into poverty are almost twice as likely to die before the age of five as those from wealthier families.
5. Children of educated mothers—even mothers with only primary schooling—are more likely to survive than children of mothers with no education.

Maternal health

• Maternal mortality has fallen by almost 50 per cent since 1990
• In Eastern Asia, Northern Africa and Southern Asia, maternal mortality has declined by around two-thirds
• But maternal mortality ratio – the proportion of mothers that do not survive childbirth compared to those who do –   in developing regions is still 14 times higher than in the developed regions
• More women are receiving antenatal care. In developing regions, antenatal care increased from 65 per cent in 1990 to 83 per cent in 2012
• Only half of women in developing regions receive the recommended amount of health care they need
• Fewer teens are having children in most developing regions, but progress has slowed. The large increase in contraceptive use in the 1990s was not matched in the 2000s
• The need for family planning is slowly being met for more women, but demand is increasing at a rapid pace

HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases

1. At the end of 2014, there were 13.6 million people accessing antiretroviral therapy
2. New HIV infections in 2013 were estimated at 2.1 million, which was 38 per cent lower than in 2001
3. At the end of 2013, there were an estimated 35 million people living with HIV
4. At the end of 2013, 240 000 children were newly infected with HIV
5. New HIV infections among children have declined by 58 per cent since 2001
6. Globally, adolescent girls and young women face gender-based inequalities, exclusion, discrimination and violence, which put them at increased risk of acquiring HIV
7. HIV is the leading cause of death for women of reproductive age worldwide
8. TB-related deaths in people living with HIV have fallen by 36% since 2004
9. There were 250 000 new HIV infections among adolescents in 2013, two thirds of which were among adolescent girls
10. AIDS is now the leading cause of death among adolescents (aged 10–19) in Africa and the second most common cause of death among adolescents globally
11. In many settings, adolescent girls’ right to privacy and bodily autonomy is not respected, as many report that their first sexual experience was forced
12. As of 2013, 2.1 million adolescents were living with HIV
13. Over 6.2 million malaria deaths have been averted between 2000 and 2015, primarily of children under five years of age in sub-Saharan Africa. The global malaria incidence rate has fallen by an estimated 37 per cent and the mortality rates by 58 per cent
14. Between 2000 and 2013, tuberculosis prevention, diagnosis and treatment interventions saved an estimated 37 million lives. The tuberculosis mortality rate fell by 45 per cent and the prevalence rate by 41 per cent between 1990 and 2013