Growing inequalities will undo significant health gains – UN Report

General News of Sunday, 16 February 2014

Source: GNA

The United Nations International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Beyond 2014 Report says growing inequalities will undo significant gains in health and longevity made over the past 20 years.

The Report highlights the fact that development gains from the past 20 years could be sustained, unless governments tackled the inequalities that hurt the poorest and most marginalized.

It noted that achievements over the ensuing 20 years had been remarkable, including gains in womens equality, population health and life expectancy, educational attainment, and human rights protection systems, with an estimated one billion people moving out of extreme poverty.

The Report said, fears of population growth that were already abating in 1994, had continued to ease, and the expansion of human capability and opportunity, especially for women, which had led to economic development, had been accompanied by the continued decline in the population growth rate from 1.52 per cent per year in 1990-1995 to 1.15 in 2010-2015.

The ICPD Beyond 2014 Global Report is the culmination of a landmark UN review of progress, gaps, challenges and emerging issues in relation to the ICPD Programme of Action.

It gathers data from 176 member states, alongside inputs from civil society and comprehensive academic research.

To sustain these gains, the Report, which was launched in New York by the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) Executive Director, Dr. Babatunde Osotimehin, argues that governments must pass and enforce laws to protect the poorest and most marginalized, including adolescent girls and women affected by violence as well as rural populations.

The document also underlines that the number of people living in extreme poverty in developing countries has fallen dramatically from 47 per cent in 1990 to 22 per cent in 2010, but many of the estimated one billion people living in the 50-60 poorest countries would stagnate as the rest of the world gets richer.

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Growing inequalities will undo significant health gains - UN Report