Backgrounder: Health Important to Sustainable Development

Home>>World

Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, August 26, 2002

Backgrounder: Health Important to Sustainable Development

Sustainable development is not possible without a healthy population -- yet most development activities have impacts on the environment, which can in turn cause or exacerbate many health problems.

DISCUSSION

CHINESE

SEND TO FRIEND

Sustainable development is not possible without a healthy population -- yet most development activities have impacts on the environment, which can in turn cause or exacerbate many health problems.

Poor health and disease are costly. HIV/AIDS has killed millions of people in their most productive years, while water and air pollution continue to kill millions of people every year, mostly in developing countries.

World Health Organization Director-General Gro Harlem Brundtland has pointed out that HIV prevalence rates of 10 to 15 percent, which are no longer uncommon, can translate into a reduction in growth rate of GDP per capital of up to one percent a year.

Tuberculosis, which is exacerbated by HIV, take an economic toll equivalent to 12 billion US dollars from the incomes of poor communities, she noted, adding that "Africa's GDP would probably be about 100 billion more now if malaria had been tackled 30 years ago, when effective control measures first became available."

Some 11 million children under the age of five die each year in developing countries. About 70 percent of these deaths are caused by either diarrhoeal diseases, respiratory infections, malaria, measles or malnutrition.

Between 5 and 6 million people in developing countries die each year from water-borne diseases and air pollution.

Poor environmental quality contributes to 25 percent of all preventable illness in the world today.

More than 60 million people have been infected with HIV/AIDS. About 92 percent of all cases are in developing countries.

Questions?Comments? Click here

Backgrounder: Some Global Challenges on Sustainable Development

>> Full Coverage

China's Exports Hit Record of US$56.2 Billion in July ( 36 Messages)

China's On-going Reform Calls for Better Economic Illumination ( 31 Messages)

Fourth Unmanned Spaceship Set to Roar by Yearend ( 46 Messages)

FM Spokesman Rejects Al-Qaida Contacts Allegation ( 48 Messages)

Commentary: Taiwan Independence No Easy Thing ( 57 Messages)