March 11th, 2008 at 1:19 pm | posted by Virginia Simmons
World champion Ethiopian runner Meseret Defar continued her 5-year undefeated streak by winning the 3000 meter at the World Indoor Championships on Saturday. All through the race, Meseret Defar wore her white band. (Getty Images)
From the IAAF:
“It was somewhat inevitable the multi-talented Defar would prevail, and so it proved as she simply destroyed the field by winding up the pace from 400m out and unleashing her legendary kick-finish over the final lap.
And even Defar herself conceded in a post-race interview victory here at the Palau Velodromo Luis Puig was not the most testing of her career. “Today it was an easy race for me, because of that I didn’t have to run too fast,” she explained. “I feel that I’m ready for Beijing (Olympic Games) now.”
Posted in Runner, Meseret Defar, White Band, Sports, Ethiopia | No Comments »
January 31st, 2008 at 5:49 pm | posted by Virginia Simmons
A new report on malaria from the World Health Organization outlines some positive news. Among the key findings is that the distribution of bed nets and medications have cut malaria deaths in half in Rwanda and Ethiopia.
From a Washington Post article this afternoon:
“This is the first time we have seen these results with the new tools,” said Arata Kochi, head of malaria programs for WHO.
“This is a genuinely historic achievement,” said Richard G.A. Feachem, former director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. “This is not theoretical. We do not have to wait for a vaccine or new drugs. If we implement today’s technologies aggressively on a national scale, we will have a big impact.”
Two key items in the current “tool kit” are bed nets impregnated with insecticide that lasts three to five years and treatment with at least two drugs. One of them is artemisinin, a compound originally derived from a Chinese herbal medicine.
Read the Washington Post article here. Tomorrow we’ll be able to link to the full report.
-Virginia Simmons
Posted in Rwanda, World Health Organization, Ethiopia, Malaria | 4 Comments »
August 20th, 2007 at 2:43 pm | posted by Porter McConnell, ONE Policy and Coalition Coordinator
Women’s empowerment has been getting a boost in a small village in the Amhara region of Ethiopia. The village of Awra Amba (”Top of the Hill”) was founded by 20 Muslim and Christian peasants in the 1980s and now has 400 residents and a growing fan club.
According to a piece in the Christian Science Monitor, the village is an experiment in egalitarianism in an otherwise traditional society, a community where education is emphasized, women are given three months maternity leave from work responsibilities, and men join the women in cooking and weaving, traditionally female activities. Awra Amba’s vision of women’s empowerment, the third UN Millennium Development Goal, has attracted increasing attention internationally:
“Government officials and members of parliament, sheikhs and priests, and local and foreign nongovernmental organization workers have made the trip via a rocky road only accessible with a four-wheel-drive vehicle to see the success for themselves.
“I was completely captivated by my visit to the community,” says Ambassador Tim Clarke, head of the European Union delegation to Ethiopia. “I regard it as the model for the world community on how gender issues should be treated. I have come across nothing else like it anywhere in Africa – and indeed the world. I am using it to inspire the work of my office here on gender mainstreaming and empowerment of women.”
-Porter McConnell
Posted in Good News, Women, Ethiopia | No Comments »
