M'sia Achieves All MDGS Except On HIV/AIDS - Mustapa

JAKARTA, Aug 4 (Bernama) -- Malaysia to date has achieved all the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), set to be attained by countries worldwide by 2015, except for one on curbing the spread of HIV/AIDS, Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Mustapa Mohamed said.
To ensure achievement of that target before 2015, he said Malaysia had taken drastic actions and was treating the issue very seriously to halt and had begun to reverse the spread of the disease as required by the MDGs.
"Alhamdulillah, so far, we have achieved all but one of the MDGs. We should have been able to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS but instead it's on the rise in the country," he told Bernama on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Regional Ministerial Meeting of the MDGs here Thursday.
Mustapa, who is also Malaysian National Economic Action Council (NEAC) Executive Director, represented Malaysia at the two-day meeting which gathered delegates from 40 Asia-Pacific countries to share experiences and plan partnerships towards 2015 MDGs at the Jakarta Convention Centre.
The eight goals, set by the United Nations Initiative to be achieved worldwide by 2015, are to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, attain universal primary education, promote gender equality and empower women, reduce child mortality, improve maternal health, ensure environmental sustainability, develop a global partnership for development and combat HIV/AIDS and other diseases.