"The biggest enemy of health in the developing world is poverty."
-- Kofi Annan, former Secretary General of the United Nations
The four most common childhood illnesses are diarrhoea, acute respiratory illness, malaria and measles. Each of these illnesses is both preventable and treatable. (UNICEF)
Approximately 2.5 million children die each year because they are not immunized. (UNICEF)
In 2005, about 10.1 million children died before they reached their fifth birthday. Almost all of these deaths occurred in developing countries – including ¾ of them in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, the two regions that also suffer from the highest rates of hunger and malnutrition. (UNICEF)
In 2005, 32% of children under 5 years of age – 178 million children in total – were estimated to be stunted (or seriously below normal height for one’s age). More than 40% of stunting was found in Africa and South-East Asia. (World Health Organization)
Approximately 39.5 million people are living with HIV/AIDS in the world. Of this figure, 63 percent live in Sub-Saharan Africa. (World Health Organization)
Global deaths from HIV/AIDS are projected to rise from 2.8 million in 2002 to 6.5 million in 2030 – under a baseline scenario that assumes antiretroviral drug coverage reaches 80% by 2012. (World Health Organization)
Tobacco-attributable deaths are projected to rise from 5.4 million in 2005 to 6.4 million in 2015 – and to 8.3 million in 2030. More than 80% of tobacco-related deaths will occur in low-income and middle-income countries. Tobacco is projected to kill 50% more people in 2015 than HIV/AIDS – and to be responsible for 10% of all deaths. (World Health Organization)
The total spent annually per person on health in Sub-Saharan African is about $20 per person – compared with about $6,000 per person in the United States. (The Earth Institute at Columbia University)
The 30 member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) make up less than 20% of the world’s population, but spend 90% of the world’s resources on health. (World Health Organization)