2016 Global Youth Development Index: Results and Analysis Table 2.7  Highest and lowest-ranked countries in the Health and Well-being domain compared with their overall 2016 YDI score Ten highest-scoring countries Health and Well-being rank Overall YDI rank Ten lowest-scoring countries Health and Well-being rank Overall YDI rank Israel 1 31 Cameroon 174 163 Kuwait 2 56 Gabon 175 169 Netherlands 3 6 Mozambique 176 177 Cyprus 4 38 Malawi 177 162 Costa Rica 5 21 Central African Republic 178 183 Federal States of Micronesia 6 64 South Africa 179 126 Qatar 7 75 Namibia 180 155 Cuba 8 57 Botswana 181 142 Singapore 9 43 Lesotho 182 171 10 37 Swaziland 183 146 Italy only indicator that deteriorated between 2010 and 2015. Nevertheless, despite these improvements, SubSaharan Africa is significantly behind the rest of the world in this domain of youth development (see Section 2.5). It is the only region in the world with an average score significantly lower than the global average. Significantly, the high-scoring YDI regions such as North America and Europe are also not doing well in the Health and Well-being domain, owing to high drug abuse and mental disorder rates on the two continents. Among all the regions, MENA is the best performer in Health and Well-being, followed by Europe, and Central America and the Caribbean. Table 2.7 lists countries with the highest and lowest ranks in the Health and Well-being domain, and compares them with their overall rank in the 2016 YDI. While the top ten countries in Health and Wellbeing belong to different regions, the ten lowestranked countries are all in Sub-Saharan Africa. Only the Netherlands scored in the top ten for Health and Well-being and also scored in the top ten overall YDI. 2.4.3  Employment and Opportunity The Employment and Opportunity domain seeks to assess the extent to which young people are in employment, their ability to access finance and economic opportunities, or whether they are in education or training that could lead to gainful employment. Average indicator scores in the Employment and Opportunity domain improved by just over 3 per cent between 2010 and 2015, with most of the progress taking place in South Asia, Central America and the Caribbean, and the MENA region. Significant improvements were recorded in young people having an account at a financial institution and adolescent fertility rate. The youth-to-adult unemployment ratio was the only indicator in the domain to deteriorate between 2010 and 2015, partially reflecting the slowdown in the global economy after the financial crisis that spread across the world in 2008. Table 2.8 lists countries with the highest and lowest ranks in the Employment and Opportunity domain, and compares them with their overall rank in the 2016 YDI. North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific are the best-performing regions in the world in this domain. Central America and the Caribbean, MENA and Sub-Saharan Africa are the regions that lag behind in this domain (see Section 2.5). The appearance of six of the highest-ranked countries in Employment and Opportunity in the top ten rankings for the overall YDI, the highest crossover ratio among all the domains, signifies the importance of this domain to youth development. 2.4.4  Civic Participation The Civic Participation domain seeks to measure the extent to which youth interact positively with their communities. \ 43