The report provides data on progress and trends in reaching the Millennium Development Goals for health, nutrition and population. It looks at poor-nonpoor disparities; health system reforms as a means of laying building blocks for the efficient and equitable delivery of interventions; the financing of health spending through domestic resources and aid; and improving the effectiveness of development assistance in health. In doing so, the report links the health Millennium Development Goal agenda with the broader poverty-reduction agenda. In addition, the report provides an inventory of World...

'HIV and AIDS in South Asia: An Economic Development Risk' offers an original perspective on HIV and AIDS as major development issues for the region. Although the impact of HIV and AIDS on economic growth appears to be very small, three risks to development are associated with HIV and AIDS in South Asia: the risk of escalating concentrated epidemics, the economic welfare costs, and the fiscal costs of scaling up treatment. As the authors show, South Asian countries have relatively low estimated national HIV prevalence rates, but prevalence is growing rapidly among vulnerable groups at high...