Millennium Development Goals
What Are the Millennium Development Goals?
The eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – which range from halving extreme poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing universal primary education, all by the target date of 2015 – form a blueprint agreed to by all the world’s countries and all the world’s leading development institutions.
Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS; Achieve, by 2010, universal access to treatment for HIV/AIDS for all those who need it; Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases.
The fight against these widely spread and highly lethal diseases is a crucial element in meeting the other Millennium Development Goals.
In 2006, 39.5 million people were living with HIV. In that year alone, 4.3 million people were infected. Additionally, approximately 15 million children around the world have lost one or both parents to AIDS. There needs to be great strides made in educating young people on how to protect themselves against HIV. The number of HIV cases is increasing at a faster rate than the growth in availability of treatment options.
Malaria causes more than 300 million acute illnesses and at least one million deaths annually.
An estimated 1.6 million deaths resulted from tuberculosis in 2005.
Sources:
http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/goals.shtml
http://www.undp.org/mdg/goal6.shtml