The global literacy rate has doubled, and the percentage of people with access to clean water has tripled. Smallpox has been eradicated, and polio is set to follow. In fact, we estimate that with our partners help our child survival programs save the lives of millions of children every year. It requires constant leadership, commitment, and a capacity to deliver. Millions of children and their mothers still suffer from the effects of births that are too closely spaced.
Malnutrition still threatens the lives of millions of children worldwide.
In parts of the world, women and children are used as instruments of war. And all over the world, famines and natural disasters put children in extreme jeopardy, and threaten to erode the progress we have made in the past few decades. Again, I say, we've made a lot of progress, but we need to do more. Countries in Africa and South Asia have seen drops in their immunization rates. In some African countries, child death rates are actually on the rise because of decreasing availability or use of basic health care.