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"Angels in the Dust"
A must-see documentary by Louise Hogarth about
an incredible South African family committed to care for 500 orphans.
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Microfinance Institutions (MFI's) Tackles Aids Head On
By Briana Sapp
Microfinance can be a powerful tool for addressing the consequences of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the short term and for removing the causes of the disease in the medium to long term. Microfinance institutions (MFIs) have begun implementing HIV/AIDS sensitizing and education programs aimed at helping borrowers to understand the disease, reduce transmission rates, and cope with overwhelming costs by providing health and funeral insurance. Debrework Zewdie, Director of the Global HIV/AIDS Program for the World Bank, calls this approach "the missing link in the fight against AIDS." According to UNAIDS, women are biologically two to six times more likely to become infected with HIV/AIDS. The UN agency says 76 percent of all women living with HIV live in sub-Saharan Africa.
www.ipsnews.net/africa/nota.asp?idnews=37456
Originally posted online April 23, 2007 via IPSnews.net
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AFRICA ACTION
Salih Booker, Executive Director of AFRICA ACTION
(www.africaaction.org),
talks about blindspots in coverage of key global
issues like poverty and AIDS in Africa, and how
IWT can do better.
Watch
video clip.
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Number with HIV 'at highest yet'
UNAIDS says there are an estimated 40.3m people currently living with the virus across the world, with almost 5m infected in 2005. read more
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2005 UNICEF Reports
"The State of the World's Children." Half of the world's children do not have their basic needs met due to poverty, war and AIDS.
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ADDRESS TO INTERNATIONAL
CONFERENCE ON AIDS
STEPHEN LEWIS, the UN Secretary-General's Special
Envoy for HIV/AIDS, address to the International
Conference on AIDS and STI's in Africa September
21, 2003
"It is now commonplace that grandmothers are
the caregivers for orphans --- I've certainly seen
it in every country without exception --- but that
is no solution. The grandmothers are impoverished,
their days are numbered, and the decimation of families
is so complete that there's often no one left in
the generation coming up behind." "…millions
of children live traumatized, unstable lives, robbed
not just of their parents, but of their childhoods
and futures. How can this be happening, in the year
2003, when we can find over $200 billion to fight
a war on terrorism, but we can't find the
money to prevent children from living in terror?"
Excerpt from Address by
Stephen Lewis The UN Secretary-General's
Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa at the
Official Opening of the XIIIth International Conference
on AIDS and STIs in Africa, September 21, 2003
Read
Stephen Lewis' complete speech
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Convention on the Rights of the Child
Children's rights are set out in the Convention
on the Rights of the Child, the most widely ratified
(given legal force) human rights convention of all
time. In 1989, world leaders decided that children
needed a special convention just for them because
people under 18 years old (children) often need
special care and protection that adults do not.
read
more
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Women and girls bear the brunt of the global
AIDS epidemic worldwide.
The Global Coalition on Women and AIDS is a worldwide
network of civil society groups, governments, UN
agencies, and concerned citizens who have come together
to make the AIDS response work better for women.
A dynamic, diverse, but coherent alliance, the Coalition
is dedicated to empowering women to take control
of their own lives in a world with AIDS. read
more
——
Millennium Development
Goals (MDG’s)
In 2000, nearly 200 leaders from around the world
adopted the Declaration and committed themselves
to achieving a set of eight Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs). The MDGs outline a comprehensive and
ambitious plan to end extreme poverty and hunger,
ensure that all boys and girls complete primary
school, promote gender equality, improve the health
of children and mothers, reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS
and other diseases, and protect the environment.
The ultimate objective of this agreement is to make
the world a better place for all by the year 2015.
read more
Other links:
MDG’s Project
www.unmillenniumproject.org
Youth and the
Millennium Development Goals:
Challenges +
Opportunities for Implementation www.mdgyouthpaper.org/mdgyouthpaper.pdf
[PDF]
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Unite for Children – UNICEF Campaign
The world must take urgent account of the specific
impact of AIDS on children, or there will be no
chance of meeting Millennium Development Goal (MDG)
6 – to halt and begin to reverse the spread
of the disease by 2015. Failure to meet the goal
on HIV/AIDS will adversely affect the world’s
chances of progress on the other MDGs. The disease
continues to frustrate efforts to reduce extreme
poverty and hunger, to provide universal primary
education, and to reduce child mortality and improve
maternal health. read
more
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UPDATES
FROM THE INSTITUTE OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT. A
multi-media resource for environment and development
policy makers. read
more...
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