Health in the Sustainable Development Goals: Where Are We Now in the South-East Region? What Next?

The new Sustainable Development Agenda ‘Transforming Our World: the 2030 agenda for sustainable development’ was adopted by the UN General Assembly in September 2015. The 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) reflect a significant change in thinking about how to accelerate sustained improvements in development – in general and in health more specifically.

Health is centrally placed in the 2030 Agenda. The health goal (SDG3) is comprehensive: ‘to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages’. SDG3 builds on the significant success of the health-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). It recognizes an ‘unfinished MDG agenda’; it responds to new health priorities and increasing concerns about health security, and the health impact of migration and climate change. The SDG agenda recognizes that human health and well-being depend on the political, economic and social systems, and the natural environment, within which people live.