You may know that malaria kills more than a million people (not just children – people) a year –every 30 seconds a child in African dies – and costs African economies over $12 billion.
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But there is a simple solution to this large problem – an insecticide-treated net. $10 covers the cost to purchase and distribute the net and educate on its use, and for a limited time, a generous sponsor of Nothing But Nets will send a bed net on your behalf when you sign up! Saving lives has never been easier. Â
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To commemorate World Malaria Day on April 25th, we’ve created an interactive online game, Deliver the Net, www.NothingButNets.net/game that let’s you experience the distribution of bed nets and some of the obstacles we face on the ground.
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Through the UN Foundation and our Nothing But Nets campaign we’ve already helped cover seven African nations, including Zimbabwe and Mali, and we have our sights set on more.Â
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I hope you enjoy the game!
“In a video message for a World Malaria Day event at U.N. headquarters, Ban said the initiative will offer indoor spraying and bed nets treated with long-lasting insecticide “to all people at risk, especially women and children in Africa.” The video was obtained Thursday by The Associated Press.
It will also ensure that public health facilities have access to effective malaria treatment and diagnosis, that health workers are trained to deal with the disease, and that research into its eradication is encouraged, Ban said.
Ban said he wants these measures in place in just a few years. “The aim is to put a stop to malaria deaths by ensuring universal coverage by the end of 2010.”
The secretary-general said that several African countries “have made dramatic strides in malaria control, but the most affected nations remain off track to reach the goal of halting and reversing the incidence of the disease.”
“That is why today, together with the Roll Back Malaria Partnership, I am putting forward a bold but achievable vision,” Ban said.”
Yesterday, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing to discuss reforming foreign assistance.
The hearing comes just in time. US foreign aid has saved millions of lives and helped millions more overcome poverty. But foreign aid is still underperforming and often fails to reach the people who need it most. At the hearing, Oxfam president Raymond Offenheiser illustrated the problem with a story:
During the Asian tsunami in 2004, the U.S. government responded rapidly and effectively with humanitarian relief. But when it came time to rebuild, villagers in Thailand were delivered unsolicited boats from the U.S. government and other aid agencies. Villagers who were day laborers, not fishermen, before the tsunami, felt obliged to become fishermen in order to put the boats to use. One villager told researchers, “We got too many boats and there are not enough people or fishing spots to go to.†A fisherman in the village quipped, “I think there are more boats than fish.â€
During the hearing, Chairman Howard Berman (D-CA) remarked: “It is painfully obvious to Congress, the Administration, foreign aid experts, and NGOs alike, that our foreign assistance program is fragmented and broken and in critical need of overhaul.†Republican Ranking Member Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) likened the disorder of the current foreign aid structure to a “spaghetti bowl.â€
When the bi-partisan HELP Commission convened to study the issue reported their findings to Congress last fall, they marvelled that “not one person appeared before this Commission to defend the status quo.â€
Much of this mess is enshrined in the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. Over the years, the Act has become a maze of red tape that’s 1500 pages long. It has 33 stated goals and 247 directives – many in conflict with each other. It’s a testament to the commitment and talent of our foreign aid professionals that they have managed to work around the system to continue producing results for the poor. However, even their best efforts are stumbling under the bureaucratic crush.
Oxfam America is seeking reform of US foreign aid to make it more focused on ending global poverty. Also testifying at the hearing were Lael Brainard from Brookings, Steve Radelet from the Center for Global Development (CGD), and former Congressman Jim Kolbe from the German Marshall Fund. Oxfam America is part of a group of nonprofits and thought leaders calling for a new Foreign Assistance Act to create a cabinet-level agency out of the hodge podge of agencies and initiatives working on foreign aid today. The movement gains traction every day. Learn more about Oxfam’s aid reform campaign , and stay tuned for how you can help.
-Porter McConnell, Aid Reform Campaign, Oxfam America
If you’re a NYC-area ONE member or are going to be visiting the Big Apple between April 30 and May 4, you won’t want to miss the world premiere of “A Powerful Noise,” co-hosted by ONE and CARE. This moving documentary by Tom Cappello follows four women – Nada Markovic, Bui My Hanh, and Jacqueline “Madame Urbain” Dembele – as each of them go about the daily business of empowering, educating, and seeking justice, weaving through locations in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Mali, Vietnam and to tell a tale of hope much larger than the sum of its parts.
Yesterday, World Bank Group President Robert B. Zoellick released a statement about Japanese Prime Minister Fukuda’s call to put the world hunger crisis on the agenda for the July G8 meeting.
“I welcome Prime Minister Fukuda’s intention to put the food crisis firmly on the agenda of the G8 summit in Japan in July, and his request that the World Bank, the United Nations, and other international institutions coordinate closely to prepare joint action. We will be pleased to support Japan as chair of the G8…
Donors must act now to support the World Food Program’s call for emergency funds to fill what is an urgent financing gap. Without this money, millions will go hungry. For them, the international system will have failed.
It will be important that as an international community we coordinate closely, minimize overlap and attack the issue from a variety of different fronts to ensure support reaches where it is needed most, and that longer-term supply issues can be fully addressed.
These short, medium and long-term issues will be a critical part of international action. But let us first raise the money to meet the most immediate needs. The world can afford this. The poor and hungry cannot.”
Todd Jennings from PATH continues to send in daily updates about World Malaria Day from Zambia.
World Malaria Day was born Africa Malaria Day following a commitment by African leaders in 2001. The Abuja summit set benchmarks for malaria control and prevention by 44 African countries, including Zambia. Recognizing that the disease reaches beyond this continent, the commemoration is now known as World Malaria Day. This year’s slogan (Malaria, a disease without borders) and theme (United Against Malaria) demonstrate how connected we are in the 21st century. People travel more than ever and mosquitoes don’t respect borders, so it’s imperative that countries work together to fight malaria.
Yesterday, the First Lady of Zambia, Maureen Mwanawasa, gave a talk about HIV/AIDS and malaria, an interaction she described as the collision of hippos and elephants. Those with developing or compromised immune systems—children under five, pregnant mothers, the chronically ill—are most at risk of malaria.
World Malaria Day, the First Lady reminded us, is not a day to be depressed about the toll of the disease. Rather it’s a day to celebrate what’s possible. We have the means to prevent malaria at our disposal—treated bednets, house spraying, lifesaving drugs. All that’s left is for people to join together to kick malaria out of Zambia, Africa, and the world.
UPDATE: In this video clip, see the First Lady of Zambia deliver her malaria address:
-Todd Jennings, Advocacy Officer, Malaria Control and Evaluation Partnership in Africa (MACEPA), a program at PATH, Lusaka, Zambia.
An op-ed in Tuesday’s IHT offers an interesting perspective on the surge in world food prices. Author Robert Paarlberg points out that the hunger crisis was brewing long before food prices shot up.
Rising prices are having the harshest impact on urban populations, which are traditionally better off than their rural counterparts and rely on international markets for food. In cities across the developing world, rising prices are forcing people to reduce spending on things like gas and health care in order to feed their families.
The true epicenter of the hunger crisis is in rural areas, where poverty levels are much higher and subsistence agriculture is the main source of employment. Paarlberg argues that hunger here depends less on international food prices and more on agricultural productivity. He writes,
Africa’s food crisis grows primarily out of the low productivity, year in and year out, of the 60 percent of all Africans who plant crops and graze animals for a living… The average African smallholder farmer is a woman who has no improved seeds, no nitrogen fertilizers, no irrigation and no veterinary medicine for her animals. Her crop yields are only one third as high as in the developing countries of Asia, and her average income is only $1 a day.
Paarberg points out what we at ONE and many others in the development community are arguing- agricultural productivity is key to addressing the hunger crisis in poor countries, especially in sub-Saharan Africa.
The long-term solution to such problems is not lower international prices or more food aid, but larger investments in the productivity of farmers in Africa. African governments essentially stopped making these investments 25 years ago, when the international donor community pulled back from supporting agricultural modernization in the developing world.
The current price boom offers the international community an opportunity to mobilize global action against hunger by investing much-needed resources into agricultural productivity. Lower food prices and emergency food aid will help alleviate food insecurity and enable aid organizations to deliver emergency food, but implemented alone they won’t address the underlying sources of the hunger crisis.
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
Yesterday, the House Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing to discuss reforming foreign assistance. 
