The last five years have witnessed increased efforts by G8 nations and United Nations agencies to improve the health of the world's 3 billion people living on less than US$2 a day. Most of this attention has focused on efforts to intensify resources for fighting the three most devastating diseases: HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. Together, these “big three” account for a staggering 5.6 million deaths and the loss of 166 million disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) annually (see annex tables 2 and 3 in [1]). Prominent partnerships and initiatives are now devoted to the big three (Box 1), and increased global attention to these diseases (and to the risks posed by avian influenza and other emerging viral infections) culminated in the November 2005 TIME Global Health Summit, branded by Bono as the “Woodstock of Global Health” ( http://www.time.com/time/2005/globalheal?th ).
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