Isabel dos Santos is Africa’s richest woman, worth an estimated $3 billion. She has amassed a global empire of businesses, luxury apartments, and artwork, and built a reputation as a self-made woman who succeeded through hard work and determination. But reporting by investigative journalists has revealed she may have used secrecy and her government connections to help amass her fortune. Those connections included her father, who was president of Angola for 38 years until he stepped down in 2017. Dos...
This year, in the face of a global pandemic, the fight against global poverty and inequality became tougher, but more important than ever. Our tireless activists fought for fair deals on debt, vaccine access, aid budgets, and more. Hundreds of thousands of global activists signed petitions, completed surveys, tweeted at or sent emails to politicians, attended briefing calls, shared messages of solidarity, or danced to our anthem “Stand Together.” Here’s a quick look at some of what ONE and our activists...
In 2020, global health has gone from a fringe issue to the forefront of people’s mind, all thanks to COVID-19. The last time the entire world came close to being as focused on a pandemic threat was over two decades ago, when HIV/AIDS was killing almost 4,000 people every day and new infections doubled year after year. Since then, the global response to AIDS has become a success story, and AIDS-related deaths have been cut by more than half. Today,...
With Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, and AstraZeneca all announcing this month that their vaccine candidates for COVID-19 are proving to be highly effective in clinical trials, the world is closer to finding a safe and effective vaccine to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the pandemic will not end with a vaccine, but when everyone, everywhere has equal access to it. That’s why we launched our Vaccine Access Test in September. The Test provides the framework to answer one important question: Are the...
“It is our responsibility to prepare children to take on future challenges with knowledge, integrity, and care,” Alexandra, a ONE youth ambassador from Italy, believes. That’s why investing in and preparing future generations now is the key to creating a better future for everyone, regardless of age, around the world. World Children’s Day does just that by promoting children’s rights. Having started in 1954, every year on 20 November the world comes together “to promote international togetherness, awareness among children...
The world is racing to find safe and effective vaccines against COVID-19, and world leaders are making deals for promising COVID-19 vaccine candidates and speaking about the need for vaccine equity. As this happens, we want them to know that we’re watching. That’s why in September, ONE launched the Vaccine Access Test. The Test provides the framework to answer one question: Are the actions taken by world leaders and players moving us closer to or further from an equitable outcome...

Ripping up the rulebook on debt

Last week, G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors decided to extend the debt service suspension initiative (DSSI) until the end of June 2021, accepting that more must be done to help the world’s most vulnerable countries. They also agreed to a new initiative that would go further on debt relief – including by bringing private-sector creditors into the fold. The World Bank also announced that it will consider providing more emergency COVID-19 relief, although, unfortunately, it would not suspend...
COVID-19 has presented many new social and economic challenges, and is exacerbating already existing ones. One such challenge is global poverty. Right now over 700 million people live in extreme poverty worldwide, which is defined as living on less than US$1.90 per person per day. Right now, the pandemic is threatening to push up to 115 million people into poverty in 2020 alone. That would raise global totals significantly. As we mark the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty on...
Falling on 11 October, International Day of the Girl Child is a United Nations day that brings attention to “girls’ rights and the unique challenges girls face around the world.” Empowering young girls early in life can give them the “potential to change the world — both as the empowered girls of today and as tomorrow’s workers, mothers, entrepreneurs, mentors, household heads, and political leaders.” However, as we’ve seen with previous health crises, COVID-19’s lingering economic and social impacts on...
The results are in: Americans support global access to an effective COVID-19 vaccine and want to see stronger US leadership in the fight against preventable disease. New polling conducted by Morning Consult on behalf of the ONE Campaign found over 80% of Americans believe healthcare workers, the elderly, and at-risk groups anywhere in the world should be the first to get a COVID-19 vaccine, before healthy people in the US. With the 2020 presidential election approaching, the poll also found that...