Poor states need 150 yrs to reach UN goals on child health: WHO

The World Health Organisation reiterated that the health-related targets set under the eight United Nations Millennium Development Goals in 2000 would not be met by the 2015 deadline under current trends.

"The evidence so far suggests that while there has been some progress, too many countries - particularly the poorest - are falling behind in health," WHO Director General Lee Jong Wook said in the progress report.

Despite goals of halving hunger or curbing child mortality, the situation has even worsened in some instances as poor countries struggle with chronic problems, according to the data in the report.

"We've got 10 years until 2015," said Andrew Cassells, director of health and development at the WHO.

"When it comes to an issue like child health, if the present rate of decline continues it's not going to take 10 years to achieve the goals, it's going to take 150 years," he told journalists.

Between 1990 and 2002 -- the most recent data cited -- the number of people with insufficient food went up by 34 million in sub-Saharan Africa, 15 million in south Asia, and by eight million in western Asia the report found. It fell by 47 million in east Asia.

More than half the children in south Asia are malnourished, while the average for developing nations in 2003 stood at one-third.

However, the proportion of under five year-olds who are underweight in south, southeastern and east Asia fell by nine to six percent between 1990 and 2003, while in Africa it has barely changed (32 percent).