A Better Future for Children: Progress Toward World Summit Goals for Health and Nutrition
F. Marc LaForce, Robert Steinglass, Marcia Griffiths, Indira Narayanan, Tina Sanghvi, Remi Sogunro, Paul Ickx, Kim Cervantes

June 2001

Published by the Basic Support for Institutionalizing Child Survival Project (BASICS II) for the United States Agency for International Development. Arlington, Virginia
global policy, history, commitment, development

Abstract: In 1990 world leaders assembled at the World Summit for Children made a commitment to “give every child a better future” and established 27 goals for improving children’s health and well being by the year 2000. Progress toward those benchmarks will be the focus of the first special session of the United Nations General Assembly devoted to children, to be held 19-21 September 2001. In preparation for this meeting, the U.S. Coalition for Child Survival asked a number of experts to write briefing papers assessing efforts to achieve the goals of the 1990 summit. This document contains papers drafted by BASICS II staff summarizing what has been learned and accomplished during the past decade in eight important areas of child survival and makes recommendations for the future. The topics covered are: 1) maintaining a high level of immunization, 2) preventing neonatal tetanus, 3) reducing deaths from diarrhea, 4) reducing deaths from acute respiratory infections, 5) reducing deaths from measles, 6) reducing malnutrition, 7) promoting children’s growth, and 8) improving newborn health.