Last year, Njeri, a hawker in Nairobi, was paying 90 shillings (roughly $0.8) for a packet of maizemeal. Today the same packet goes for 120 shillings, a 30% increase. She is also paying more for non-food items, such as rent and electricity. Njeri’s rent for a single room in Kangemi, an informal settlement, increased by more than 10%, from 4,500 Kenya shillings to 5,000 Kenya shillings (roughly $44) a month, which is nearly a third of her income.
As a...
ONE
Many African countries reacted positively to the recent news that the German biotechnology company BioNTech will be building COVID-19 vaccine manufacturing plants in Rwanda and Senegal. Across the continent, insufficient and unpredictable vaccine supplies, poor distribution networks, and infrastructure challenges have hampered mass vaccination efforts. Proponents of vaccine technology transfer to African countries view this development as a positive step to improve vaccination rollouts across the continent.
The pandemic has been a wake-up call for African countries that rely solely on...
TOP NEWS
A coup for COVID: The coup in Burkina Faso threatens to hamper the country’s COVID response and exacerbate the existing humanitarian crisis. Coup leader Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba rationalized his move by arguing that President Kaboré failed to defend against jihadist attacks. With the army distracted by efforts to consolidate power, jihadists may be the winners. Only 3.6% of the country’s population is fully vaccinated and over half the population has insufficient food. Increased political instability could worsen the...
If your social media feed or city streets were flooded with calls to #EndThePandemic once and for all, then you’re familiar with our Global Week of Action.
From 15-22 January, ONE, our dedicated Global Activists, and our partners called on leaders of rich countries to finally make 2022 the year they end the pandemic and vaccinate the world.
Here’s what happened.
Taking over billboards and social media
All week long ONE and it’s partners took over billboards in France, London and Berlin, plastered...
Top news
Money, money, money: The world’s 10 richest men made trillions during the pandemic. They doubled their fortunes, at a rate of $15,000 every second. Some have chosen to do good – the Gates Foundation and the Wellcome Trust pledged $300 million to CEPI (CEPI is seeking a total of $3.5 billion to tackle the minor issues of pandemic response and preparedness). But even if each of the 10 richest men gave away 99.9% of their current wealth, they would still be richer than 99% of...
Top news
Lost generation: Uganda’s schools reopened after nearly two years of COVID-19 closures – the longest in the world. More than 50% of students stopped learning as a result. One-third of students are expected to stay out of school, instead working to support their families. And many teachers have been lost to other professions. The situation is similarly dire in South Africa, where at least 775,000 students have dropped out and teen pregnancies have increased by 60%. The changing nature of the virus means it...
As children across Africa return to school this week, they might find a very different landscape to the one they left behind before the pandemic. Classroom sizes in some schools will be smaller due to high dropout rates, especially among adolescent girls.
COVID-19 has shut an entire generation in Africa out of the education system. Millions of children in low- and middle-income African countries will not return to schools as they reopen due to a variety of reasons. That includes...
Top news
Model behavior: A new COVID vaccine is on the block – and the US scientists behind it decided to make it available to the world (read: no patents, no-frills tech transfer, and a round of applause from us to the makers, Texas Children’s Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine). Production is underway in India under the drug name CORBEVAX, and its inventors speculate that it will soon reach more people in middle- and low-income countries than those donated by G7 nations. It’s...
Did you know that #Omicron and Transformers (yes, those Transformers) have a lot in common?
Omicron is the pandemic’s latest threat against us. And by hoarding the supply of COVID-19 vaccines, world leaders are allowing variants like Omicron to continue to grow and spread. That means Omicron may be the latest variant to spread around the world — but it certainly won’t be the last.
Learn more and demand that leaders of rich countries share vaccine doses to end the pandemic...
In my lifetime I’ve had the privilege and honor to meet American presidents and leaders from all over the world, but Archbishop Desmond Tutu commanded more authority than any person I have ever known. His was borne not of faith, nor of religious hierarchy or the status of the positions he held; it emerged from who he was.
He was fierce, and never hesitated to call out injustice, whether to comrade or foe. He was fair – always willing and...