Babar Tasneem Shaikh.
Do we need to be skeptical about millennium development goals?.
Pak J Public Health Jan ;1(1):56-8.

Background: Pakistan still presents huge gaps in catering to the massive health needs of the large segment of its population living in rural and remote areas. High maternal mortality, neonatal, infant and child mortality, the population pressure on meager resources and ever increasing differentials in urban and rural, rich and poor and among genders is becoming noticeable. Poverty has compounded the toll of preventable illnesses, preventable malnutrition and preventable deaths. Where are gone the primary health care pledges? Discussion: Poverty and hunger has been increasing the toll of morbidity and mortality in Pakistan. The dearth of political commitment compounded by current economic crisis does not allow a respectable allocation to health, education and other social sector projects. The international economic trends and their repercussions on the national agendas are having serious implications for common man\'s day to day living and public grievances are on the rise. Access to quality health care and education has become even more difficult. The efforts to revitalize the whole political economy in the country seem invisible or feeble at both government and development partners\' end. Having gone through devastated crisis of population displacement because of terrorism, earthquake and floods, government has shown minimal interest in seeking external debt relief which appears to be a pre-condition for at least keeping the hopes up for meeting the targets of MDGs. The pledges and assistance of the international community has not been sufficient to support the economy of Pakistan and in this scenario, the social sector has suffered the most. Summary: Local and national level efforts must continue to safeguard all the determinants of health, particularly in the developing and under-developed countries. There is an intense need of meaningful inter-sectoral collaboration and political and economic reforms in both government and within private sector to achieve the millennium goals directly related to health. What would be the post-MDGs new roadmap, given all the human rights violations and social exclusion across the developing countries? The picture becomes even more skeptic because the MDGs need not only to be attained, but also sustained for a longer term-post 2015.

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