Sen. Bill Frist, MD, in Mozambique

Sen. Bill Frist, MD, is traveling through Mozambique and Rwanda for the next ten days and working with groups like Africare, Save the Children, Samaritan’s Purse, and the ONE Campaign to visit and observe the great work of U.S. led initiatives. Throughout the trip he’ll be blogging on the Healing Hands blog and here on the ONE Blog.

Vanduzi Town, Mozambique
13 July 2008

I had the privilege today to spend time right outside of Chimoio, Mozambique yesterday, in Vanduzi Town. Africare is doing some amazing work in this village, namely a housing project called Project COPE. Africare, partnering with Habitat for Humanity and the government of Mozambique (who provided the land), had built 30 new homes for families in need, many of whom were suffering from HIV. The homes were made with 100% local supplies and modern materials, rather than the traditional homes in the area. They were painted in a handsome, ochre color, and they featured sloped roofs that reached almost to the ground in order to prevent the rains from damaging walls of the house over time.

I met a young widow who was a beneficiary of one of the homes (See picture). Her husband had died of HIV/AIDS, and she was left to support three children. She began to cry because she was so incredibly thankful for the dignity that her home brought to her there. She explained that before this house they had had to live in a terribly camped hut. But, now they were in her dream home. Her little four-year-old started crying as well because his mother was so happy.

Africare also supports a Community Care Committee (CCC) by paying and training fifteen CCC members, chosen by the community, to oversee the humanitarian response. As a part of this response, each of these CCC members takes care of 15 HIV orphans, and they provide them with food, mentoring, education, housing, and a kind of advocacy: they identify their needs and then go to the community seeking on their behalf to provide for those needs. For instance, three times a week they provide a hearty, nutritious meal (see picture: dish of corn, vegetables, peanut butter, etc.) for young Israel an orphan recently diagnosed with HIV, who has been taken in by his grandmother, Taleza (see picture).

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Save the Children: Advocacy Day

I’m excited to be involved for the first time in Save the Children’s annual Advocacy Day program in Washington (June 11-12). Particularly at a time when the world food crisis threatens to push more people – especially vulnerable children in the developing world – back into poverty, this event gives us all an opportunity to do something for those children and their families.

Did you know that over 10 million children die yearly from preventable or treatable diseases and low cost solutions can do something about it? That’s 26,000 children a day! AIDS and malaria are killing only a small proportion. Most die of diarrhea, pneumonia, and measles. Four million of these deaths occur to newborns – less than one month old – in villages in Africa and Asia. That’s not right, especially since there are low cost solutions that can prevent these deaths from happening.

Save the Children is going to focus its June program on building support for the U.S. Commitment to Global Child Survival Act (H.R. 2266, S.1418). This legislation will strengthen American’s role in saving the lives of children and mothers in the world’s poorest countries by investing in low-cost, highly effective, lifesaving interventions such as vitamins, antibiotics and vaccines.

Already over 100 Senators and Representatives from both parties support this bill, but more must be done to get this legislation passed. We need to come together and tell Congress to provide more help for these children and families in countries like Nigeria, Congo, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Afghanistan.

If you want to make a difference for these kids like I do, join us June 11-12 in our call for change & reserve a spot today; register at www.savethechildren.org/advocacyday2008. If you have any questions, please email me at advocacyday@savechildren.org.

Advocacy Days is a terrific opportunity for us to make a difference by letting our elected officials know there is a voice calling for lasting change in the lives of children in need.

-Ryan Quinn, Save the Children

Attend an anti-poverty conference

It’s gearing up to be an exciting summer for poverty-fighting activists here in the nation’s capital! ONE works closely with several organizations that are hosting national conferences, trainings and advocacy workshops in Washington, DC in May, June and July. Please check them out and spread the word!

May 27-31: Global Health Council: 35th Annual International Conference: “Community Health: Delivering, Serving, Engaging, Leading”

June 11-12: Save the Children: Advocacy Day 2008

June 13-15: Sojourners: Pentecost 2008: “Training for Change”

June 17: Bread for the World: Lobby Day 2008

June 18-19: CARE: 2008 National Conference

July 12-16: RESULTS Educational Fund: International Conference to End Poverty

July 15-16: U.S. Global Leadership Campaign and Center for U.S. Global Engagement: Washington Conference

-Margaret McDonnell, US NGO Partnerships and Faith Relations Team, ONE

Frist: An Idea for Mother’s Day.

Tuesday I had a tremendous experience in Memphis when I helped launch Save the Children’s State of the World’s Mothers report, which draws attention to the fact that more than 200 million children under age 5 worldwide lack basic health care measures. These aren’t high-tech, high-cost health care interventions…these are simple solutions like antibiotics to treat pneumonia or a remedy of sugar and salt when mixed with clean water that can treat diarrhea. These measures can save more than 15,000 children’s lives around the world every day.
And while that seems like a topic that is very distant from our lives in America or Tennessee, my time in Memphis with the children and faculty of Lamplighter Montessori School brought home how close we really are to the far corners of the world – and how every person, young and old alike, can make a difference in the lives of kids in need halfway across the globe.

I had the great pleasure of talking with students about my trip to Bangladesh last August, when I helped deliver hand-knitted baby caps to new moms and newborns in Save the Children health programs there, which are supported by USAID. Indeed, Lamplighter students themselves made some of the 3,000 caps from Tennessee that made their way to Bangladesh to keep babies warm (and increase their chance of survival) during their first critical hours and days of life.

There was a real excitement about being with the children whose little hands knitted the caps that I had the ultimate pleasure of putting on babies’ heads in Bangladesh as everything came full circle. It was extraordinary to be a part of the entire process … but it was even better knowing that all of us had pulled together to make a big and important difference in the health of children living in Bangladesh and in other countries where children don’t always make it past 5 years old.

Lamplighter students ages 7 to 10 knitted caps and used their voices as part of a project to call on their leaders in Washington to increase funding for newborn and child health programs in developing countries. They told me about their “hard day of lobbying” on Capitol Hill, where they went with baby caps in hand to be heard on behalf of all the world’s babies. Who wouldn’t be inspired by the actions of such young children trying to make a difference?

You can help, too. I’ve mentioned the Global Child Survival Act in this blog before. This legislation, backed by more than 100 members of Congress on both sides of the aisle, could save the lives of millions more newborns and young children globally – every year – and provide health solutions where they are most needed.

It’s critical that you let your representatives in Washington know that you support this bill … and that you keep the power of using medicine as a currency for peace in mind when visiting the ballot box in November. Let’s not let this opportunity to save millions of young lives pass. What better gift can we give moms around the world this Mother’s Day than to raise our voices to address this challenge?

-Former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, M.D

Caps to our Nation’s Capital; Frist to a TN School

On Tuesday, May 5, Save the Children and Doctor and Former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist visited our school to launch the 2008 State of the Worlds’ Mothers Report. Who would think that learning to knit would bring so much excitement? Not the first second and third graders in Cordova, TN at Lamplighter Montessori School who knitted infant caps for Save the Children’s Caps to the Capital campaign!

Our students knitted the caps and sent them to Save the Children. Then they were invited to D.C to lobby with Save the Children. This week our school was chosen as The United States launch site for the 2008 report. Bright and early on Tuesday morning our students went on TV to promote awareness of the report. Later in the day, Senator Frist visited the school to talk about the simple and inexpensive ways children’s lives can be saved; warm caps for infants, hand washing, clean water and immunizations. The students showed Senator Frist the caps they had knitted in anticipation of another “Caps to the Capital” campaign.

Our Middle School students presented Save the Children, Senator Frist, Shelby County Mayor A. C. Wharton and ONE with student paintings to show our appreciation for the work being done to help children all over the world reach their first birthday.

-Terrie Sampson, Head of School, Lamplighter Montessori School

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Burma

Five days since Cyclone Nargis hit Burma, the state media has reported 22,464 confirmed dead and 41,054 missing. The “UN estimates hundreds of thousands have been left homeless and millions are without food and water. Up to 40 per cent of the victims are believed to be children.” (Australian Daily Telegraph.)

From the BBC:

“In a statement, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged authorities in Burma - also known as Myanmar - to allow foreign aid workers and supplies into the country…But Burma has refused to waive visa requirements for many waiting aid workers…

Survivors face poor sanitation and a lack of access to clean water.

Flooding could lead to outbreaks of mosquito-borne malaria and dengue fever, while water-borne diseases such as cholera and dysentery are also a threat.”

Many of ONEs’s allies are mobilizing for relief for Burma. You can learn more on these sites: Oxfam, CARE, Save the Children, International Medical Corps and International Rescue Committee.

UPDATE: “The information that we’re receiving indicates that there may well be over 100,000 deaths in the delta area,” Shari Villarosa, the charge d’affaires in Burma, tells reporters during a conference call.” (USA Today)

-Virginia Simmons

A “Purl” Among Poverty Programs

Last year, Save the Children asked knitters and crocheters to raise their voice and use their skills to help save the lives of millions of children by through our Caps to the Capital Campaign. We received over 280,000 baby caps and almost 11,000 personal notes to President Bush asking him to do more to save the lives of the nearly 10 million children who die under the age of 5 every year from preventable or treatable diseases.

Now, we want to send the same message to the NEXT president of the United States and you can help us by participating in Caps to the
Candidates. Knit one baby cap, attach a signed note asking the candidate to prioritize global child survival and give/mail it to your favorite presidential candidate. Together, we can remind them that Americans care about children around the world and we want the next president to do more to help save their lives.

For more information go on “Caps to the Candidates” visit our website:

-Katherine Pace, Save the Children

Frist Things Frist: Save the Children

As a Tennessean who has been involved with ONE for several years, I was excited to read the New York Times article on September 7th about Senator Bill Frist’s involvement with Save the Children’s new child survival campaign. Senator Frist aims to bring the fact that millions of children die from preventable deaths to the American public’s attention. Children are dying before their 5th birthday from pneumonia, diarrhea and other complications that can all be cheaply prevented and treated. Senator Frist says, “We have the tools that are inexpensive, reproducible and proven, yet they’re not being applied.” As Americans, we should join Senator Frist and continue asking our elected leaders to support the Global Child Survival Act.

The article also mentions Senator Frist’s involvement with ONE vote ‘08. I am thankful to see that he is using his authority and influence to talk to the Republican presidential candidates about why they should commit to investing more on maternal and child health. I look forward to seeing how he continues to use his voice to bring these issues to the forefront of the presidential debate.

-Katherine Pace, Save the Children