"Parts of the US as poor as Third World"

Timing is everything. After a week in which the world learned how America takes care of its poor, the UN released its annual Human Development Report. Among the unflattering statistics and conclusions:

the long decline in US child mortality (children who die before their fifth birthday) has reversed since 2000

the infant mortality rate in the US is now the same as in Malaysia

Blacks in Washington DC have a higher infant death rate than people in the Indian state of Kerala

Hispanic Americans are more than twice as likely as white Americans to have no health coverage

Child poverty rates in the United States are now more than 20 per cent

The report describes the US as having "an overdeveloped military strategy and an under-developed strategy for human security."