Of the more than 40 new commitments to the Secretary-General’s strategy, 25 of those included measures to increase the number of health workers. Importantly, the UK government pledged more health workers for South Africa and Uganda.
While child survival has tremendously improved in the past decades — the global under-five mortality rate has fallen by 32% between 1990 and 2009 — many children still live without the most basic healthcare services. Some 40 million children in 25 developing countries with high levels of child mortality are living in healthcare deserts.
What a wonderful day for the Tanzanian programme! It was one of those days when you know exactly why it’s worth staying in the office long hours, struggling through fundraising, reporting and writing pages and pages of documents.
Millions of girls continue to experience disadvantage and discrimination that prevents and interrupts not only their right to education, but many of their other fundamental rights.
2010 was a devastating year in terms of disasters. The lives of over 200 million were affected by earthquakes, floods and cyclones and nearly 300,000 people lost their lives as a result. The costs of these events are also staggering — in 2010 the costs reached $110 billion.
With committed leadership, and, importantly, with effective donor support, even the poorest countries can make big reductions in infant and maternal mortality. It was really inspiring to chat recently with the Professor David Mphande, Minister of Health of Malawi. Malawi is one of the pioneer countries devoting 15% of its budget to health, and is determined to train, hire, and properly support more and more healthworkers so that the needs of the country’s children can be met. Because of this, Malawi will meet the MDGs for maternal and child survival. Here’s the video of my conversation with the Minister.
As Sierra Leone rolls out the first vaccination programme against pneumonia, our latest report finds that further investment is needed from donors to bridge funding gap for vaccines.
In an eventful week in Westminster, we launched our ‘parliamentary champions’ scheme, and asked MPs ‘what does the year hold for children in poverty at home and abroad?’.
‘Tis the season for New Year’s resolutions my friends’ and colleagues’ intentions for 2011 made me realise that I hadn’t even considered mine. Lots of us know we should eat less and do more, but instead we dream of ‘miracle diets’ and ‘celebrity fitness regimes’ when we know they won’t work, and aren’t good for us. Ignoring the problem and hoping for a quick-fix is what we do – and this ostrich-with-head-in-sand approach is favoured the world over, not just by individuals, but governments too…
Parliamentary and legislative quotas are an excellent first step to ensure the equal representation of men and women within national governance, which as Glenys Kinnock points out, can also have positive effects for the economic and social development of a country.
