T ackling diseases and conditions which disproportionately affect the poor is central to WHO’s work. Efforts to achieve the MDGs are thus part of WHO’s core business. WHO has extensive programmes to assist countries in their efforts to tackle HIV/AIDS, TB, and malaria; improve child and maternal health and nutrition; and scale up access to essential medicines. As a reflection of this, WHO’s commitment to the Millennium Declaration has been reaffirmed by its governing bodies (2, 3) and WHO’s next General Programme of Work will cover the period 2006 to 2015 - a time frame that was chosen specifically to correspond to the MDG target date of.
