Global wealth inequality threatens progress made in reducing child mortality, Save the Children report says

While progress has been made worldwide in reducing child mortality, the effects have been unequal across income groups, and wealth inequalities are at the highest level in 20 years and increasing, according to a report (.pdf) from Save the Children U.K., BBC News reports (10/31). Released ahead of a meeting of a U.N. high-level panel on poverty taking place in London this week, the report, titled "Born Equal," "argues that against a backdrop of overwhelming progress (extreme income poverty has dropped from two billion in 1990 to less than 1.3 billion today and child mortality has almost halved) the poorest of the poor have too often been excluded," which "means that children living in the same country may have vastly different chances of surviving to the age of five, getting a good education and eating a nutritious diet," a Save the Children press release states. Save the Children U.K. Chief Executive Justin Forsyth said, "Unless inequality is addressed, the [Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)] and any future development framework will simply not succeed in maintaining or accelerating progress" in reducing child mortality, according to the press release (11/1).