How successful were the Millennium Development Goals?

The Brookings Institution published its new study entitled "Change of pace: Accelerations and advances during the Millennium Development Goal era". The paper examines which trajectories changed, for better or worse between 2000 and 2015. The three key findings of the study are the following: firstly, at least 21 million extra lives were saved due to accelerated progress. During the 2000s there were major accelerations in rates of progress. Secondly, acceleration varied considerably across issues and geographies. Positive changes were concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa and low-income countries, as classified by the World Bank in 2000. Thirdly, low-income country acceleration versus middle-income country gains shows a major difference in trends among low-income countries (LICs) versus middle-income countries (MICs). LICs indicated more acceleration but smaller relative gains, while MICs tended to see larger relative gains but less acceleration.