Good health is a key to human happiness and well-being. It contributes remarkably to prosperity, wealth and economic progress, as a healthy population is more productive and lives longer. Disease also burdens family and public resources, weakens societies and waste potential. Thus, the health and well-being of all people at all ages lies at the heart of sustainable development. Accessing good health and well-being is a basic human right, Source: Sds.Un hence, the Sustainable Development Agenda offers a new chance to ensure that everyone can access the highest standards of health and health care.
Sustainable Development Goal No. 3 objective is to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all. By 2030, there should be nobody dying needlessly from communicable diseases like AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and other preventable diseases.
It also aims to achieve universal health coverage, and supply access to safe and effective medicines and vaccines for everybody. To support development and research for vaccines is an indispensable part of this process also as expanding access to affordable medicines.
Currently, the world is facing a global health crisis as COVID-19 is spreading human agony, sabotaging the global economy and upending the lives of billions of people around the globe. Such health emergencies pose a global risk and highlight the acute need for preparedness. They require the entire government and a whole community response, matching the resolve and sacrifice of frontline health workers.
Goal 3 targets:
The UN has provided the following 9 specific targets (fig1) to create action to promote health and well-being for everyone.
What progress have we made so far?
Major progress has been made in several areas, including in child and maternal health as well as in addressing communicable diseases like HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases.
Maternal mortality has decreased by almost 50 per cent since 1990 and 13.6 million people had access to antiretroviral therapy by the end of 2014 as well as
measles vaccines have prevented nearly 15.6 million deaths since 2000.
How much will it cost to reach these targets?
Healthy people are the base for healthy economies, no matter what the cost. For example, if we invest $1 billion in increasing immunization coverage against pneumonia, influenza and other preventable diseases, we could save 1 million children’s lives each year. In the past decade, advancement in health and healthcare led to a 24 per cent increase in income growth in some of the poorest countries.
The cost of inaction is more, millions of children will continue to die from preventable diseases, women will die in pregnancy and childbirth, and health care costs will continue to fall millions of people into poverty. Noncommunicable diseases alone will cost low- and middle-income countries more than $7 trillion in the next 15 years.
India and Goal 3
India has created some progress in decreasing its under-five mortality rate, which decreased from 125 per 1,000 live births in 1990-91 to 50 per 1,000 live births in 2015-16, and its maternal mortality rate, which decreased from 212 per 100,000 live births in 2007-09 to 167 in 2013.
India has additionally created vital strides in reducing the prevalence of HIV and AIDS across different kinds of high-risk categories, with adult prevalence reducing from 0.45% in 2002 to 0.27% in 2011.
The Indian government’s National Health Mission emphasise on national wellbeing and is leading modification in this area, additionally to targeted national programmes against sexually transmitted diseases like AIDS/HIVS.
The Global Action Plan (GAP):
The World Health Organization (WHO) has launched the worldwide Action Plan for Healthy Lives and Well-being for all to push forward the SDG 3 on achieving good health for all. This action plan brings together 12 multilateral health, development and humanitarian agencies to raise support countries to accelerate progress towards the health-related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The 12 GAP signatory agencies are:
1. Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance;
2. Global Financing Facility for Women, Children and Adolescents (GFF)
3. Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Global Fund)
4. Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS)
5. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
6. United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)
7. United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)
8. United
9. United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women
(UN Women)
10. World Bank Group
11. World Food Programme (WFP)
12. World Health Organization (WHO).
Four key commitments made in the GAP are Engage, Accelerate, Align, Account
What can we do to help?
This isn’t an issue that can be dealt with by the governments alone. We must all contribute by promoting and protecting our own health and also the health of those around us. To begin with make well-informed choices, practise safe sex and vaccinate children.
We can raise awareness in our community concerning the importance of fine health, healthy lifestyles as well as people’s right to quality health care services. We can also hold our government, leaders and other decision-makers accountable to their commitments to improve people’s access to health and health care.
We may have come a long way, but we still have a longer way to go. Real progress means making essential vaccines and medicines affordable to everyone, ensuring that women have full access to sexual and reproductive health care, ending all preventable deaths of children and achieving universal health coverage. Ensuring healthy lives for all may cost a little plenty, but the advantages outweigh the price. After all, it's health that's real wealth and not the pieces of gold and silver.
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