Amid recent concerns over trade agreements preventing the manufacture of cheap pharmaceuticals in India, two announcements this week bring hope to HIV/AIDS patients in the developing world.
When hurricane season began on June 1, InterAction members working in Haiti were prepared for the storms with warehouses stocked with items such as water, kerosene stoves, tents and other equipment. This disaster preparedness builds on the work international NGOs have been doing to help Haitians rebuild their lives after the devastating earthquake on January 12, 2010.
Please visit our Haiti page for updates from our members on their programs there over the last 18 months since the earthquake, including:
Child rights organization Plan International urges India to take action to combat the discrepancies between genders and curb the problem of “vanishing” girls, as the world waits to surpass the estimated 7 billion population mark on October 31.
Plan is set to mark the special day by commemorating the birth of a girl in India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh – which accounts for the highest number of ‘missing girls’- by registering “Baby 7 Billion” with the state government and issuing her a birth certificate at a public event.
Despite agreeing last week to withdraw from the north/south border ahead of Southern Sudan’s secession on Saturday, troops from the north continue to gather in Southern Kordofan.
Clashes have intensified over the past several weeks leading up to the secession, and humanitarian aid has been blocked on all sides. According to AlertNet, the clashes have displaced over 73,000 civilians in the past month.
A free-trade agreement currently being negotiated between the EU and India could potentially lead to the deaths of millions of AIDS patients who depend on cheap generic drugs produced by India, according to Michel Sidibe, executive director for the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).
The agreement is likely to restrict India's ability to produce anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs, and would most affect those in Africa, where 86 percent of people on treatment take drugs made in India. The trade deal could drive up prices, limit options and delay access to improved drugs.
Members of the U.S.-based NGO alliance InterAction released the following quotes on the outcome of the G8 summit in Deauville, which ended earlier today:
DEAUVILLE - For NGOs seeking to get their voice heard at a G8 summit, staging stunts is often the most effective way to attract media coverage. There have been a few good ones this time round by several of InterAction’s members attending this year's summit in Deauville, the pretty seaside town in northern France.
InterAction hosted a special event yesterday, Disability & Inclusive Development: A Special Briefing and Dialogue on USAID, State Department, and NGO Strategies and Initiatives. Charlotte McClain-Nhlapo, USAID’s Coordinator for Disability and Inclusive Development, Judy Heumann, Special Advisor for International Disability Rights at the US Department of State and David Morrissey, President and CEO of US International Council on Disability were panelists.
For the past five years, the DATA Report has monitored the historic commitments to sub-Saharan Africa that the G8 and European Union made in 2005. These promises were due to be delivered in 2010, a year that also marked the crucial two-thirds point for the world to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2015.
Aicha gazes out the window, her crystal blue eyes taking in the gray sky outside a hospital near the Syrian border in Jordan, where she has been recovering for a month now. She was badly injured after her house in Dara’a, Syria was destroyed in a mortar attack.
I arrived home one afternoon to find my best friend in my village, Gifty, closing up her shop and preparing to go to the hospital. She told me that her two and a half-year-old son, Justice, was brought there by her husband Jackson and she was going to join them.
Over 40 governments, along with UN organizations and the World Bank, have committed to a common standard and time schedule for publishing aid information under the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI). There are high expectations for this initiative. The ultimate objective is to increase the effectiveness of donor assistance, making aid work for those whom we are trying to help and contributing to accelerated development outcomes on the ground.
Last week, a delegation of ministers from the Government of the Republic of South Sudan were in DC to participate in the South Sudan Economic Partners Forum. Hosted by the U.S. and South Sudan in coordination with the European Union, Norway and the United Kingdom, more than forty other governments and international organizations were present to discuss with the South Sudanese officials their country’s current economic and development challenges and ways to address them.
Submitted by Blog Moderator on Mon, 04/22/2013 - 11:45am
Almost everyone acknowledges the importance of addressing inequality. But will it become a focus of the new post-2015 development agenda, and reinforce our priorities as a development community moving forward?
Submitted by Blog Moderator on Thu, 04/18/2013 - 12:11pm
As the long-dreaded sequestration process begins to set in, U.S. government programs that have already been feeling the heat of budget pressures are now starting to feel the pinch. Across all agencies and departments, there has never been such heightened vigilance to determine the quality, value, and effectiveness of taxpayer-funded programs in order to save them from landing on the proverbial chopping block. U.S. foreign assistance is no exception, and in fact, is likely to be a popular target despite notable progress over the past decade in how aid is delivered.
Submitted by Blog Moderator on Wed, 04/17/2013 - 12:27pm
Having dedicated my career to public health, I've learned that keeping people healthy is a complex job. Medicine, sanitation, nutrition, education – all are necessary and interrelated components of preventing and curing sickness. But there is one tool that stands out as the most effective way to protect fight disease: vaccines. Every child – no matter where he or she is born – has a fundamental right to vaccines.
Over the past 18 years, the American public told pollsters they believe the U.S. government spends way too much on foreign aid, reckoning that something like a fifth or a quarter of the federal budget is used for that purpose.
Do you think today’s university students and young professionals lack idealism and just lean on numbers? Last week, New York Times Columnist David Brooks wrote about the “Empirical Kids.” The article starts a fantastic conversation about the next generation of policy leaders.
