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Public health experts shared their views on the second day on World Health Assembly in Geneva. That included tackling on the adoption of world leaders last September of the 2030 agenda for sustainable development.

The agenda focused on Sustainable Development Goals, the new to-do list for the world for a fairer and safer world. The SDG build on the millennial development goals, the ones which were supposed to have been achieved back in 2015.

A key change that can save millions of lives

Though the commitment was not able to address them two years ago, they were able to focus on the issues and in turn saved millions of lives. Regardless, such was able to focus on efforts and saved millions of lives.

Health experts weigh in on how they were able to reduce premature deaths.

“SDG is of course the new development vision for the world. It is the future we want. It is a set of goals which has been developed through a very transparent consultative inclusive process compared to the MDGs,” says Dr. Nata Menabde, executive director for the World Health Organization Office at the United Nations in New York.

She adds that MDG was all about eradicating poverty but this time around, they are trying to improve on that by building people centers which includes societies and doing it while promoting economic growth and also protecting the environment.

Menabde also points out that achieving SDG will need to address other determinants. That includes addressing things like peace, security and all the dimensions. But perhaps the most important of all is achieving it in an equitable manner.

The problem is that parties involved in the effort need to make the necessary integration of their respective policies. Menabde singles out that their efforts are not merely about health but also about how to influence bodies when it comes to adapting health in their policies. And apparently that is the main agenda they want to cover right now in Geneva.

Maternal deaths far from resolved

Also tackled was a specific area of SDGs which had to do with improved numbers as far as saving women during pregnancy and childbirth. Some figures revealed that since 1990, the number of maternal deaths worldwide dropped by 43%. Further, undefined deaths declined from more than 12 million in 1990 to 6 million in 2015.

“It was a great success but the job is not yet finished and this is where Sustainable Development Goal comes in,” says Dr. Flavia Bustreo, Assistant Director general Family, Women’s and Children’s Health WHO.

Biggest killers to maternal mortality

She also enumerates the biggest killers to maternal mortality. Among those that Bustreo mentioned are sepsis, hypertension, indirect obstetric causes (linked to incommunicable diseases), obesity particularly in adolescents. As far as the children, she points mentioned pneumonia, diarrhea and under-nutrition as some of the principal causes.