PRESS
RELEASE

Moving Towards
a New Century of Health
in the Americas

New PAHO Report Cites Dramatic Health Improvements, Uneven Distribution

Washington, DC, September 22, 2003 (PAHO)—Nations in the Americas are seeing dramatic health improvements, including longer life expectancy and lower infant mortality rate, but the benefits of this progress are distributed unevenly, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) says in a new report.

PAHO's analysis of health data shows that income factors, literacy rates and access to clean water and sanitation are indicators of whether groups of people or entire nations share in the health advances that marked the end of the 20th century, the organization says in its 2003 annual report, Moving towards a New Century of Health in the Americas.

"Health is considered to be a stabilizing element that ensures governance and steady, equitable economic growth by strengthening citizenship-building and guaranteeing the enjoyment of basic rights," Dr. Mirta Roses Periago, director of PAHO, wrote in the report, which was presented today to health ministers meeting here.

Among the findings in the PAHO report:

• From the period 1950-1955 to 1995-2000, the median life expectancy at birth in the Americas increased from 55.2 years to 72.9 years. Overall, the life expectancy gap between rich countries and poor ones narrowed during the last half of the century. However, that was not the case everywhere. The inequity gap actually widened for Haiti, even though the life expectancy at birth there increased from 37.6 years to 52.0 years during that time.
• The median rate for infant mortality dropped from 42.5 per 1,000 live births in the early 1980s to 32.0 by the late 1990s. However, the gap between the countries with the best infant mortality rates and those with the worst ones remained virtually unchanged.

"Overall, these findings point to the need for international cooperation and political commitment to confront a double challenge: continue to pursue decreases in average health risk, and specifically support the definition and implementation of health strategies that have inequality reduction as a clear target," the PAHO report said.

Toward that end, PAHO has a millennium health initiative that sets targets for improvements in health conditions by 2015 and beyond that addresses a set of broader issues that have a bearing on health: reducing poverty, improving health and education, and protecting the environment.

"For the Region of the Americas, the Millennium Development Goals represent an unfinished agenda — the ethical commitment of ensuring that, by 2015, priority countries and population groups lagging farthest behind can attain indicator values today considered to average values for the Regional populations as a whole," the PAHO report says.

The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) was established in 1902 and is the world's oldest public health organization. PAHO works with all the countries of the Americas to improve the health and quality of life of its people. PAHO also serves as the Regional Office for the Americas of the World Health Organization (WHO).