The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which the international community has defined as the pillars of development for coming years, are necessarily broader and more numerous than the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Only a comprehensive approach that pays attention to broader causes can aim for sustainable development.

However, there is a widespread consensus that, particularly in countries with lower incomes, efforts should be concentrated first and foremost on meeting urgent, basic social needs such as health, education, food, and water. This is why health continues to be a central theme (the third goal) in the new SDGs too.

On this point, the post-2015 goals decisively support Universal Health Coverage (UHC) with a view to strengthening the local health system. For epidemiological, technical, and ethical reasons, maternal and child health are still at the core of the health needs on which we focus, with particular attention to malnutrition, tuberculosis (TB), malaria, HIV/AIDS, and chronic and degenerative diseases.

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