Millennium Development progress report.

The United Nations has issued a progress report on the Millenium Development Goals, which were set in September 2000 in an attempt to halve world poverty by 2015. Most countries appear on track to halve the number of people without access to safe water (although 800 million would still be at risk), but progress toward meeting sanitation goals is slow or nonexistent in several regions. By 2015, about 2.4 billion people could still face disease and death due to poor sanitation, which contributes to the spread of cholera and diarrheal disease, killing a child every 21 seconds. Western and southern Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and Oceania are among the regions showing the least progress; conditions are deteriorating in some developed countries such as the former Soviet republics.