Rich countries must spend an additional $38 billion a year on health aid by 2015 to break a cycle of disease, war and poverty in the world's poorest countries, according to a report launched today.
The extra money would save eight million lives each year, said the report by 18 of the world's top economists and public health specialists which maps out a new global blueprint for health.
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Besides improved health, greater life expectancy and lower birth rates, the spending would yield big dividends in political stability and international security as populations in developing nations become less vulnerable and more productive.
The crux of the 210-page report is that improved health is a prerequisite for economic development, a finding which departs from conventional thought, which suggests health will automatically improve on the coattails of economic growth.
"Africa will not be able to get right until the major pandemics, AIDS - but also tuberculosis and malaria - are brought under control," Mr Jeffrey Sachs, a Harvard economist who chaired the World Health Organization's (WHO) Commission on Macroeconomics and Health, said.
"They're so poor that they can't address the problems that are making them poor. They're trapped," Mr Sachs said.
At a news conference in London, WHO Director-General Ms Gro Harlem Brundtland described the report as a turning point for health.
"It is not just another plea for more resources in one key sector. The commissioners argue for a comprehensive global approach to sustainable development with concrete goals and specific time frames," she said.
Singer Bono of the rock group U2 told the news conference he hoped the report would mark the moment the developed world woke up to the crisis in poor countries.
"It doesn't actually cost that much to save the world," he added.