In Zambia, a rainy season has raised fears of a cholera outbreak. To help prevent a cholera outbreak, UNICEF and its partners have launched a new advocacy campaign called “Your Life is in Your Hands.”

The key to the campaign’s effectiveness, according to UNICEF, is that it relies on peer-to-peer advocacy, meaning that children and young people become effective ambassadors in spreading the importance of good hygiene to their peers. The campaign is being rolled out “through town–hall meetings for school children, follow-up events in schools, radio public service announcements and a UNICEF cartoon character named SOPO.”

You can read more about “Your Life is in Your Hands” here.

Today is World Pneumonia Day and you can watch the Global Pneumonia Summit live right now.

Child advocates from around the world are gathering in New York City to hear the latest on how we can raise the profile of child pneumonia and get policymakers everywhere to act.

Speakers include:

• Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Director of The Earth Institute at Columbia University and Special Advisor to the United Nations’ Secretary-General
• Singer-songwriter and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Angélique Kidjo
• ABC News’ senior health and medical editor Dr. Richard Besser
• WHO and UNICEF present a new report, the Global Action Plan for the Prevention and Control of Pneumonia, which provides a road map for preventing and treat child pneumonia in the world’s poorest countries.
• And leading global health experts, philanthropists, faith-based leaders, corporate representatives and child advocates to begin to change the way the world responds to the #1 killer of children—pneumonia.

Earlier this week, UNICEF, the WHO, and the World Bank issued a joint report on the state of the world’s vaccines. The report found that while more children are being vaccinated than ever before, nearly 24 million of the world’s most at-risk children are still not receiving life-saving vaccinations.

Dr. Mickey Chopra, UNICEF Chief of Health and Associate Director of Programmes discusses the report in this short clip. For those who might not have time to read the full findings, I thought this would be of value:

UNICEF, the WHO and the World Bank came together today to announce that while more children are being vaccinated than ever before, nearly 24 million of the world’s most at-risk children are still not receiving life-saving vaccinations. Reaching these children will require an estimated $1 billion each year.

The announcement came today after new data was released in the The State of the World’s Vaccines and Immunization, a report jointly-authored by the three organizations. The report found that 2008 was a record high for global vaccinations, with more than 106 million children immunized. The report acknowledges that donor support for the GAVI Alliance (a public-private partnership launched in 2000 to increase access to new and underused vaccines) played a large role in making this possible. More than 200 million children have been immunized with vaccines funded by GAVI and over 3.4 million premature deaths have been averted.

This comes on the heels of an announcement last month by UNICEF that in 2008, child deaths dropped below 9 million (to 8.8 million) for the first time, thanks in large part to immunizations, the use of insecticide-treated bed nets to prevent malaria and Vitamin A supplementation. Yet more than 3 million of the 8.8 million children who still die every year are dying from two main killers: pneumonia and diarrhea. New vaccines exist that could prevent the majority of these deaths, but they are still not available in the world’s poorest countries.

Over the coming months and years, GAVI Alliance will be the main vehicle for getting these new vaccines to the countries that need them most. With increased donor support, GAVI partners plans to introduce the vaccine against pneumococcus, the bacterium that causes pneumonia, in 42 countries and the vaccine against rotavirus, which causes diarrhea, in 44 countries by 2015.

Together, these could prevent an estimated 11 million child deaths by 2030. Here at ONE we’re looking forward to helping GAVI, donors and other partners to make this plan a reality.

Today is Global Handwashing Day. And even in America, with soap and safe water easily accessible, it never hurts to remind everyone to do what mom used to say: wash your hands with soap. Even Elmo is on board, teaching kids to wash their hands often, for 20 seconds, with soap, while singing a song like Happy Birthday.

And for good reason. The truth of the matter is that handwashing with soap protects from several common diseases, including pneumonia and diarrhea. While these diseases aren’t fatal for most of us, for people in developing countries, especially children under the age of five, they can be.

Twenty-four thousand children under the age of five die every day from causes that we know how to prevent—causes such as diarrhea. In fact, diarrheal disease is second only to pneumonia as the leading killer of children worldwide and dirty hands make it easy for diarrheal disease to spread. Poor hygiene, lack of access to sanitation and unsafe drinking water together are responsible for 88 percent of diarrheal disease worldwide. Handwashing with soap, when done before eating and after using the toilet or changing a diaper, can cut that by nearly half. It’s a simple act that can save lives. We envision a day when that 24,000 unnecessary, daily deaths will be reduced to zero. We believe in zero.

A report released by UNICEF and the World Health Organization yesterday highlights the important reality that only by focusing on the preventable and treatable diseases that plague children of the developing world—like diarrhea—can we reduce global child mortality. The good news is that we know what works, and the measures to prevent and treat diarrheal disease are simple, effective, and cost-efficient.

Worldwide 1 billion people do not have access to safe water for drinking, let alone for handwashing. Child health advocates like me have long cried out for investments to assure children’s human right to be healthy and to have clean water. They also need investments that help them apply these interventions to their advantage, and yes, teaching children how to wash their hands is part of that.

In 2000, the United Nations set a challenge to all nations to commit to reducing global poverty and improving the health and welfare of people everywhere by 2015. This included a promise to stem child deaths by two-thirds.

We are well past the halfway point to 2015. Investments in health and development have made some progress toward reducing the number of child deaths, but now is the time to ensure that all of the tools we know to be effective in controlling disease throughout the western world are also used in a global effort to fight diarrheal disease. Prioritizing an integrated approach that includes handwashing with soap to control the spread of diarrheal disease is key in achieving Millennium Development Goal 4, reducing the under-5 mortality rate by two-thirds by 2015. The MDGs should be our guide, because children are at their heart.

Today is Global Handwashing Day. So, when you put down this paper, don’t forget to wash your hands. Oh sure, if you forget, you’ll survive. But remember others – especially children – around the world aren’t so lucky. Their well-being deserves our continued attention because all children deserve to celebrate their next birthday.

-Caryl M. Stern, President and CEO of The U.S. Fund for UNICEF

Actor Orlando Bloom, who has worked with UNICEF for several years now in Nepal, Russia, and Sarajevo, has been appointed a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador.

According to Ann M. Veneman, UNICEF’s executive director, Bloom will be a “voice for vulnerable children” in a role that “helps build momentum to improve the lives of children around the world.”

You can read more about the appointment on UNICEF’s Field Notes here.

Joel Madden, lead singer of the band Good Charlotte, became a UNICEF Ambassador in 2008. He’s particularly committed to supporting UNICEF’s water and sanitation programs, and is acting as the 2009 National Spokesperson for the U.S. Fund for UNICEF Tap Project.

Photo credit UNICEF/Pierre Holtz

Last year, I got to see—up close—what it’s like when safe, clean drinking water is a luxury, not a given. I traveled to the Central African Republic (CAR), where a third of the people don’t have safe water. Instead of waking up in the morning and turning on the tap, they may have to walk miles to get water from a dirty stream. Or pay someone for a bucket of water that came from a contaminated well. In a health clinic in this great little town, Sam Ouandja, we met children who were sick and dying from drinking unclean water. It was awful. I’m a father and seeing kids dying for reasons that can so easily be prevented was something I just couldn’t accept.

But every day around the world, over 4,200 children die from water-related diseases. This year, I signed up to be the spokesperson for the U.S. Fund for UNICEF Tap Project, because I want people to be aware of this horrible truth. And do something to stop it. During World Water Week, March 22–28, the Tap Project raises money for UNICEF to bring clean water to millions of kids around the world. It works like this: restaurants ask people who come in for a meal to give $1 for tap water they’d usually drink free. That one buck can pay for a child to have clean drinking water for 40 days. This is a great, simple idea that makes a difference. Go check out the Tap Project website to find restaurants near you that are part of Tap this year. Or learn about all the other ways you can donate and get involved.

On my trip to trip to CAR, I got to see some of the awesome work UNICEF is doing with the money we raise. I can’t tell you how great it felt to meet people who—because of UNICEF—had clean water in the refugee camp we went to. Or to hang out with kids at a school with a UNICEF well who were healthy—not sick from bad water. But I think about the kids I met in Sam Ouandja—children I sat with, played with, sang with… children who could die because they don’t have clean water. You can really make a difference for kids like these with the Tap Project. So please—get involved!

-Joel Madden

Are you looking for a way to support the efforts of assuring that everyone in the world has access to clean water? If you’re already planning to go to a restaurant next week, you can find one in your area that has partnered with the Tap Project and you can be part of the solution!

During World Water Week, March 22-28, 2009, the Tap Project will once again raise vital donations and awareness for UNICEF’s water and sanitation programs. For every dollar raised, a child will have clean drinking water for 40 days. All funds raised support UNICEF’s efforts to bring clean and accessible water to millions of children around the world.

Next Thursday, March 26 ONE members and their friends will be meeting for dinner at Gordon Biersch. Instead of getting tap water for free, patrons will be asked to donate $1 or more for the tap water they usually enjoy for no cost, and all funds raised will support UNICEF’s efforts to bring clean and accessible water to millions of children around the world. Participants can RSVP at the ONE event site.

-Lori Saltveit, ONE member, San Francisco Bay Area

As we continue to monitor the situation in Zimbabwe, there are a couple developments today worth noting:

Word has come that South Africa will host a regional summit on Zimbabwe. This announcement follows a failure in talks between President Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai on forming a power-sharing government.

“The summit of heads of state and government is expected to be attended by all (Southern African Development Community) member states,” the South African Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Zimbabwe is a member of SADC and the statement said the MDC was also expected to attend the summit.

South African President Kgalema Motlanthe, Mozambique’s President Armando Guebuza and Thabo Mbeki, SADC mediator and former South African president, met the two Zimbabwean sides in Harare last Monday but no agreement was reached.

A unity government is seen as the best chance of preventing total collapse in once prosperous Zimbabwe, where prices double every day and more than 2,000 people have died in a cholera epidemic.

Last week the Executive Director of UNICEF Anne M. Veneman visited Zimbabwe to meet with Mugabe and other key stakeholders The discussions “underscored the humanitarian impact on women and children.”

“The cholera outbreak is the tip of the iceberg,” said Veneman, the first head of a UN agency to visit the country in three years. “The economy in Zimbabwe is crumbling, with the highest inflation rate in the world at 231 million percent. Over half the population is receiving food aid, health centers have closed and when the school term starts there is no guarantee that there will be enough teachers.”

The Executive Director visited a cholera treatment clinic and a care center that is part of a UNICEF supported program that helps 250,000 orphans and vulnerable children.

-Chris Scott

Our friends at UNICEF just passed along this great blog post written by Clay Aiken. Enjoy!

I’m Clay Aiken, and I am a UNICEF Ambassador.

The U.S. Fund for UNICEF is proud to be a partner of ONE. ONE has mobilized millions of Americans to speak up about the importance of tackling global poverty – saving and improving lives around the world.

I’ve had a chance to see many wonderful children, full of laughter and hope, in even the poorest places around the world. And I’ve seen the incredible work of UNICEF to help those children and their families survive and thrive. But I have also seen children sick and dying from lack of basic nutrition and medicines. And I cannot forget that despite UNICEF’s work, 25,000 children die every day, mostly from preventable causes. I believe that number should be “zero”– no child dying unnecessarily.

All of us can help to save children’s lives – individuals, nonprofits, corporations, and governments.

So I am asking President Barack Obama to launch a Presidential Initiative to Accelerate Child Survival. And I am asking YOU to join me, by signing a petition to the President.

ONE supporters care about helping the most vulnerable people on our planet. Please join me in telling the next President of the United States that Americans want him to make global child survival a top priority. For more information and to sign the petition, go to:
http://volunteers.unicefusa.org/activities/advocate/presidential-initiative-to.html.

-Clay Aiken, UNICEF Ambassador

-Photos courtesy of UNICEF/Nick