The world is failing to meet health targets, as progress remains inconsistent, is decelerating, and has even reversed in certain areas, according to the World Health Statistics 2026 report, released today by the World Health Organization (WHO).
Although substantial advancements have been made in global health over the last ten years, with millions of people benefiting from enhanced prevention, treatment, and access to essential services, ongoing and new obstacles mean that the world is not on course to achieve any of the health-related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.
The significant progress highlighted in the report includes:
new HIV infections decreased by 40% from 2010 to 2024;
both tobacco use and alcohol consumption have dropped since 2010; and
the number of individuals requiring interventions for neglected tropical diseases fell by 36% between 2010 and 2024.
Access to services that influence health outcomes grew rapidly from 2015 to 2024. During this timeframe, 961 million people gained access to safely managed drinking water, 1.2 billion to sanitation, 1.6 billion to basic hygiene, and 1.4 billion to clean cooking solutions.
Encouragingly, the WHO African Region has seen faster-than-global decreases in HIV (-70%) and tuberculosis (-28%), and the South-East Asia Region is on track to reach its 2025 milestone for malaria reduction.
Nevertheless, difficulties persist. For instance, malaria incidence rose by 8.5% since 2015, moving the world further from global targets, while overall progress remains highly uneven across different regions.
Preventable risks continue to undermine health, slowing advancement. Anaemia affects 30.7% of women of reproductive age, with no improvement over the past decade. The prevalence of overweight among children under five reached 5.5% in 2024. Violence against women remains widespread, with intimate partner violence affecting 1 in 4 women globally. These ongoing risks underscore the urgent need for stronger prevention and social protection policies.
“These data tell a story of both progress and persistent inequality, with many people – especially women, children and those in underserved communities – still denied the basic conditions for a healthy life,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General. “Investing in stronger, more equitable health systems, including resilient health data systems is essential to target action, close gaps and ensure accountability.”
Urgent need to safeguard progress under strain
Advancement toward universal health coverage (UHC) has sharply decelerated. The global UHC service coverage index increased only slightly from 68 to 71 between 2015 and 2023. One quarter of the global population faced financial hardship from health costs, and 1.6 billion people were living in or pushed into poverty due to out-of-pocket health spending in 2022. Simultaneously, childhood vaccination coverage remains below target, with immunity gaps contributing to outbreaks.
Although global maternal mortality has dropped by 40% since 2000, it remains nearly three times higher than the 2030 target. Under-five mortality has decreased by 51%, yet many countries are off track. Progress in reducing premature deaths from noncommunicable diseases has slowed significantly since 2015.
Many drivers of ill health – nutritional, behavioural and environmental risks – are not improving quickly enough. Air pollution contributed to an estimated 6.6 million deaths worldwide in 2021, while inadequate water, sanitation and hygiene contributed to 1.4 million deaths in 2019.
“These trends reflect too many deaths that could have been avoided,” said Dr Yukiko Nakatani, WHO Assistant Director-General for Health Systems, Access and Data. “With rising environmental risks, health emergencies, and a worsening health financing crisis, we must act urgently – strengthening primary health care, investing in prevention, and securing sustainable financing to build resilient health systems and get back on track.”
The COVID-19 pandemic further exposed vulnerabilities in global health systems. Between 2020 and 2023, it was linked to an estimated 22.1 million excess deaths, including indirect deaths. This is more than three times the number of officially reported COVID-19 deaths. This reveals the scale of the pandemic’s global impact, reversing a decade of gains in life expectancy, with recovery remaining incomplete and uneven across regions.
Better data, improved health decisions
The report highlights major data gaps that prevent full assessment of progress. As of end 2025, only 18% of countries were reporting mortality data to WHO within one year, and nearly one third have never reported cause-of-death data. Just one third of countries meet WHO standards for high-quality mortality data, while about half have low or very low-quality or no data. Of the estimated 61 million deaths globally in 2023, only about one third were reported with cause-of-death information, and only about one fifth had meaningful International Classification of Diseases (ICD) coded data.
“Data gaps severely limit the ability to monitor real-time health trends, compare outcomes across countries, and design effective public health responses,” said Dr Alain Labrique, Director for the Department of Data, Digital Health, Analytics and Artificial Intelligence. “Country efforts to invest in stronger systems, digitalization and improved reporting standards are encouraging and should be sustained – they are essential to enable countries to collect, integrate, analyse and use health data for better decisions”.
The World Health Statistics 2026 report conveys a clear message: while global health efforts are yielding results, progress is fragile and insufficient. Accelerated action, stronger health systems, and improved data are urgently needed to revitalize progress toward the 2030 health goals.
About WHO
Dedicated to the well-being of all people and guided by science, the World Health Organization leads and champions global efforts to give everyone, everywhere an equal chance at a safe and healthy life.
We are the UN agency for health that connects nations, partners and people on the front lines in 150+ locations – leading the world’s response to health emergencies, preventing disease, addressing the root causes of health issues and expanding access to medicines and health care. Our mission is to promote health, keep the world safe and serve the vulnerable.
“Together for health. Stand with science”, the theme of World Health Day 2026, marks a year-long campaign to highlight science as the foundation for protecting health and well-being worldwide.