Category: New Zealand NGOs

Source: Save The Children

OUAGADOUGOU, 15 November 2023 – Save the Children is calling for an urgent investigation in Burkina Faso into the massacre of at least 70 civilians, mostly children and elderly people.

The attack  took place in the village of Zaongo, 100kms (about 60 miles) north of the capital Ouagadougou on 5 November but has only just come to light in a statement shared a by the Tribunal prosecutor of the City of Kaya. Kaya is home to a large number of internally displaced people.  Across Burkina Faso about 2 million people have been uprooted by fighting, making it one of the worst internal displacement crises in Africa.

Benoit Delsarte, Save the Children Country Director in Burkina Faso, said:

“This incident is a grave reminder that children bear the brunt of conflict and insecurity in Burkina Faso. Children only ask to live in a safe environment, where they can learn and live to their full potential.  In this horrific attack, they were denied this simple request.  And, For the children who survived, they will have witnessed their peers lose their lives, and their suffering may last for years.

“The perpetrators of these crimes against children must be held to account and brought to justice. Impunity for violations of children’s rights feed into the narrative that these crimes are acceptable and can create cycles of violence.

“Save the Children calls on the government of Burkina Faso to respond to all forms of violence, in all contexts, as this is essential to ensure children’s rights to survival, development and well-being. The seriousness of this incident requires that the competent authorities carry out investigations thoroughly with a view to identifying and bringing those responsible to justice.”

Save the Children began working in Burkina Faso in 1982 and implement programmes in child health, education and protection. These programmes focus on improving maternal and child health, addressing malnutrition and food insecurity, promoting school enrolment, particularly for girls, ending child marriage and keeping children safe, as well as raising awareness of children’s rights.

ENDS

Source: Save The Children

Source: Save The Children

RAMALLAH, 14 November 2023 – About 15,000 babies are expected to be born in Gaza between 7 October and the end of 2023 with all of them at grave risk amid escalating violence and with medical care, water and food at crisis levels, Save the Children said.

This projection by Save the Children is based on recent UN data estimating that about 180 women give birth each day in Gaza and accounts for the rates of multiple births in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt) as indicated by a recent study. About 15% of women giving birth are likely to experience pregnancy or birth-related complications.

Save the Children found that more than 66,000 babies are expected to be born in Gaza in 2023 with 5,500 pregnant women due to give birth in the coming month at a time when people are being cut off from essential supplies.

Clean water is scarce, food and medicines are running low, and pregnant or breastfeeding women are struggling to find food.

Hospitals and health facilities already facing severe shortages are under attack, putting thousands of patients, including pregnant women and newborns, in grave danger.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said over half of Gaza’s hospitals – 22 out of 36 – are now “non-functional”.

Maha*, a Save the Children staff member in Gaza who is now displaced to the south but used to shelter outside Al Shifa hospital spoke of what she witnessed a few days ago when fuel was running out:

“The scenes at the hospitals were horrible. Pregnant women in the hallways screaming in pain. Unidentified newborn babies in incubators, without any living family members. The fuel has run out, I had to flee, I don’t know if they survived.

Jason Lee, Save the Children’s Country Director in the occupied Palestinian territory, said:

“Babies are being born into a nightmare, a humanitarian catastrophe. Their families are being cut off from the basics. Pregnant women giving birth without medical care and premature babies dying in incubators. Fuel must be allowed into Gaza to power the generators and healthcare facilities must be protected. The violence must stop. We need a ceasefire. We need it now.”

Save the Children have been providing essential services and support to Palestinian children impacted by the ongoing conflict since 1953. Save the Children’s team in the occupied Palestinian territory has been working around the clock, prepositioning vital supplies to support people in need, and working to find ways to get assistance into Gaza.

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Notes to Editors:
Save the Children is an independent, impartial organisation. With the ongoing complete siege of Gaza, journalists and international organisations are not able to get access to Gaza to verify independently and provide updated data on the impact of ongoing bombardment on the civilian population. Save the Children, in line with OCHA updates, is currently relying on data from the Israeli Ministry of Health for casualties in Israel and from the Gaza Ministry of Health for casualties inside Gaza. Due to the current situation, information and numbers provided by both ministries cannot be verified independently.

For further enquiries please contact:

• Global Media Manager for the Middle East and North Africa Soraya.Ali@savethechildren.org
• Regional Media Manager for the Middle East, North Africa and Eastern Europe Randa.Ghazy@savethechildren.org

Out of hours media media@savethechildren.org.uk/ / +44(0)7831 650409

Please also check our Twitter account @Save_GlobalNews for news alerts, quotes, statements and location Vlogs.

Source: Save The Children

Edgar, 8, Diana*, 8, & Leonardo, 7, showing the photos of their favorite places or activities. Photo: Marla Reyes, Save the Children in El Salvador.

Racism, inequity, and discrimination begin in childhood and damage lifelong potential of children. In 2016, 4 in 10 adults claimed their childhood was blighted by discrimination[1] and this pervasive issue is prioritised in our Global Strategy. Over the past year, the Sponsorship programme has been challenging itself – and 20 countries within its portfolio – to adapt, design, measure, and programme to address root causes of inequality and discrimination.

Sponsorship is unique in that it is long term investment into a community. Programming in one impact area for a decade is an evaluators dream, providing an opportunity to develop tangible impact measure of social change.

However, when a programme is seeking to dismantle systemic discrimination that threaten children’s survival, learning and protection, the challenge for Monitoring and Evaluation colleagues is how can we measure something that may not entirely be in our control, whilst also centering the voices of children? Our answer, RUBRICS.

A Rubric, or a global assessment scale, is a framework that sets out criteria for performance, and describes what makes poor, good and excellent performance using different levels. Rubric-enhanced evaluation provides teams the chance to weave together a diverse mix of evidence, including stories, photos, and numbers, and collaboratively make sense of the information through a framework to provide a rating on a scale. By using this methodology in our evaluations, rubrics allows us to address the challenge of systematically and transparently synthesising diverse evidence on hard to measure topics such as discrimination, into one overall rating. Rubrics provide a compelling– yet concise – story of progress towards transformational change in the areas we seek to influence.

Rubrics, when applied correctly, can help shift power to communities for design and evaluation because they describe lived reality (as a progression from the current to the aspirational state) rather than representing it with abstract indicators. Working with children and communities, teams use a rating scale from “dire” to “transformational”, to complete sensemaking – a process where we jointly determine what the situation is like for children in impact areas.

To overcome the competing work priorities and specialist skill sets needed to conduct sensemaking- a critical part of the rubrics process – 3 Sponsorship offices – Zambia, El Salvador and the Philippines successfully piloted this methodology in 2023. They listened to children’s views on situation analyses, worked with children’s advisory committees to make better decisions together, and in El Salvador used age-appropriate methodologies with children to establish ratings of how “bad” discrimination was in their community.

“In the Advisory Council for Children and Adolescents, I’ve learned about Children’s Rights and the importance of influencing other people to take action on issues that involve children”, Ernesto, 17, sponsorphip child protection participant.

Ernesto, 17, reading one of his favourite Save the Children books. Photo: Marla Reyes – Save the Children in El Salvador

Learn more from how the project was implemented in El Salvador in this video.

Rubrics allow us to uncover nuances in the types of discrimination children face. In Zambia, Adolescents rated their level of inclusion in different activities and services in their communities as a 3/10, explaining social exclusion is a significant, especially for albino children and teenage pregnant and new mothers. In El Salvador 1 in 4 children said they experienced discrimination in school or in a health setting this year[2].

Through these pilots, teams learnt that:

1. Working with technical child rights, gender, disability experts across the movement provided a nuanced description of change and ratings of discrimination. However, this was not child friendly.
2. We can use Rubrics as a participatory method to rank changes for areas of programming such as how empowered communities are to make change.
3. Sensemaking, outcome harvesting, and rubrics methodologies requires specialist skills sets. We are now working to develop a facilitators guide and supporting community of practice on equality and discrimination measurement.
4. We cannot do this alone – by working with children and communities to measure changes in discrimination, we can truly shift power so that monitoring complex social change is not just a job for monitoring and evaluation colleagues, but can in itself be a strategy for social change.

Source: Save The Children

JERUSALEM, 13 November 2023 – Aid agencies operating in Gaza issued an urgent warning on Monday that fuel reserves critical for aid operations have run out, bringing the limited assistance delivered in Gaza in recent weeks to a complete halt.

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) announced on Monday 13 November that their last remaining fuel reservoir had been exhausted, rendering an aid response impossible and accelerating the current humanitarian catastrophe to unimaginable proportions.

Hospitals and health facilities, already severely crippled, and in many cases besieged and under frequent fire, are staring down the barrel of total dysfunction, unable to provide even the most basic medical services to critically ill and injured patients. Without fuel, preventable deaths already anticipated due to access impediments will skyrocket, and the suffering of the populace will reach unfathomable levels.

The two remaining water distribution plants will cease to function in the coming few hours, leaving 2.2 million people with no potable water. This is not just a collective punishment and a violation of basic human rights but an imminent public health disaster. It also means no waste or sewage removal. The people of Gaza, already enduring unbearable hardships, now face a colossal escalation of health risks, including accelerated outbreaks of waterborne diseases.

Without fuel, the few trucks of aid that had trickled in over the last few weeks – Gaza’s only remaining lifeline for delivering essential life-saving supplies – are completely immobilized.

Moreover, without any fuel to telecom power generators, we expect another complete communications black out, severing communications with humanitarian colleagues with no line of sight into when communications can resume.

Aid agencies have already been forced to triage the use of fuel to either power hospitals or provide access to water. Soon neither will be possible.

We urge all parties to recognize and uphold their obligations under international law. These include the duty to ensure the provision of humanitarian assistance and the protection of the rights of civilians in conflict zones. The decision by the Government of Israel to withhold and restrict essentials like electricity, water, internet, phone connections, and crucially, fuel, constitutes a violation of these obligations.

The international community must act collectively and decisively to ensure the uninterrupted flow of aid and the fuel required to deliver it, safeguarding the dignity and rights of all affected civilians. These impediments to a critical and principled aid response are political and must be addressed through urgent diplomacy. Immediate and decisive action is required to avert a complete humanitarian collapse in Gaza.

The Association of International Development Agencies is the main umbrella of international non-governmental organizations working in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt).

Contact information: The Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA)
Director@aidajerusalem.org
(00972) 54-6485707

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For further enquiries please contact:
Our media out of hours (BST) contact is media@savethechildren.org.uk / +44(0)7831 650409

Please also check our Twitter account @Save_GlobalNews for news alerts, quotes, statements and location Vlogs.

Source: Save The Children

Sebastian*,16, is a Venezuelan refugee who moved to Colombia with his mother Maria*, 40, and sister Joana*, 11, four years ago. Sebastian* has not managed to go back to school since leaving Venezuela due to his mother not being able to get the money needed to cover his tuition and school supplies. He spends his time in the park and attending a children’s club where he learns about his rights and how to express himself. He wishes to be able to go back to school one day and go to university to help other children get an education. He dreams of access to an education and this dream can be fulfilled with the support of the international community.

In December 2023, leaders from across the globe will gather for the 2nd Global Refugee Forum, it is a landmark opportunity to deliver decisive action for refugee children. Earlier this year, Save the Children published a new report – The Price of Hope – detailing the progress made on refugee education since 2019. This blog series is counting down to the start of the GRF with a deeper dive into some of the top refugee hosting countries, this week we are taking a closer look at Colombia.

WHAT IS THE SITUATION IN COLOMBIA?

Colombia is home to one of the largest refugee populations in the world, hosting 2,894,593 migrants and refugees mostly from those fleeing the instability and insecurity in neighbouring Venezuela. The country is itself a nation mired by a decades-long civil conflict that has led to significant loss of life, with it holding the largest number of IDP’s in the Americas and 4th in the world, the conflict increasingly threatens the safety of Venezuelans also residing in Colombia. The most recent Venezuelan displacement crisis erupted with the collapse of the economy in 2014, leading to millions fleeing the country in search of stability. The Venezuelan migrant and refugee population in Colombia, equivalent to 37% of the total number of Venezuelans who fled the country, mainly consists of families with children and other vulnerable groups, their experience is characterised by poverty, economic hardship compounded by the Covid-19 pandemic and, heightened security risks.

The Government of Colombia has an ‘open-door policy’ to Venezuelans. This includes regularisation pathways that enable migrants to legally access services, such as health and education, up to 1.8 million have used this pathway. The Ministry of National Education (MoNE) has guidelines specifically to tackle legal barriers and promote education access for migrants. Currently 6% of students enrolled in national education in Colombia are Venezuelan. The number of migrants and refugees within the formal education has been increasing, currently standing at 612.968 children with the majority being in primary education (539.645). The MoNE recognises the need for more flexible education models that allow for enrolment throughout the year and additional support to students with diverse needs.

PERSISTENT BARRIERS TO REFUGEE INCLUSION IN EDUCATION

Explicit exclusion of refugees on discriminatory grounds continues to plague the lives of many in Venezuela, wherein formal prerequisites such as the possession of legal documentation do not exist but are systematically used to reject students enrolment or even their graduation where they have completed the learning and examination. When enrolled, many migrant and refugee children encounter the harsh realities of discrimination and bullying both by students and teachers alike, inflicting psychological and emotional wounds that cap their educational outcomes and cause lasting damage to wellbeing. This is in addition to the existing traumatic wounds faced by significant numbers of refugee children in Colombia who experience the violence of conflict, such as forced recruitment and gender-based violence.

Economic fragility of the state throws up further barriers wherein the Colombian education systems’ limited capacity struggles to accommodate the large refugee population. Adding to this complexity, the economic hardship faced by many refugee populations compels many children to abandon their education in favour of labour or caretaking responsibilities. Prolonged disruptions to education make it more difficult to attain adequate grades for their corresponding year group, leading to lower grade placements, exponentially increasing the likelihood of premature school abandonment.

ECONOMIC HARDSHIP STUNTING PROGRESS FOR ALL MIGRANT CHILDREN

The government of Colombia has worked to integrate refugees into national infrastructure such as education, the social security system and, free emergency healthcare for all Venezuelan migrants. As with the 3 other countries ranked as the 4 top refugee-hosting countries, Colombia is an upper middle-income country, leaving it ostensibly better placed to handle the large displacement crisis.

However, given the higher inequality, the 8th among the countries with the highest income inequality in the world, their social integration is still limited.vii Research by the IMF has found Venezuelan migrants are more educated than local populations and yet face higher levels of unemployment and lower wages than local workers in equivalent jobs. Colombia’s inclusive approach to addressing the migrant crisis has helped lessen the impact on its refugee population, policies such as rent subsidies helped families save rent money to secure housing on a more long-term basis.

A recent Save the Children report found that Colombia spent significantly more of their GDP on education than on servicing external debt in 2020, at 5% compared to 2.6% on the latter. Figures released by the IMF show that Colombia’s debt continues to rise and its general government gross debt reached 62% of its GDP in 2021. The Colombian economy has fluctuated in the last few years as it navigated the transition to a new government and the Covid-19 pandemic, its GDP grew significantly by 7.3% in 2022 but growth is expected to slow to only 1.3% in 2023, slower but steady growth is expected to continue into the coming years.

The government of Colombia’s approach to refugee inclusion is commendable in the face of one of the largest displacement crises in the world. Colombia needs the support of the international community to meet the complex needs of its refugee population. As one of the co-convenors of this years GRF, Colombia released a joint statement with the 5 other co-convening states stressing the importance of mobilising action for refugees that encompassed the whole-of-government and society, as well as encouraging innovation on interventions and financing for refugee situations.

Without much needed support refugee children are being denied access to the life-saving and protective impacts of a quality education in a safe school environment. The international community must mobilise at the upcoming GRF to deliver bold action that ensures an education for every last refugee child, like 16-year-old Sebastian* in countries like Colombia.

FIVE THINGS SAVE THE CHILDREN WANTS TO SEE AT THE 2023 GLOBAL REFUGEE FORUM

1. Make the promise of the Global Compact on Refugees a reality. The Global Compact provide blueprints to ensure that refugees, as well as host communities, get the support they require to meet their education needs. We must not waste this opportunity.
2. Put refugee children at the heart of the Global Refugee Forum. They are experts on the challenges they face, their safe and meaningful participation must be prioritised.
3. Prioritise matched pledges to advance responsibility sharing. Educating refugee children is a global public good and must be a shared global responsibility.
4. Pledges must be meaningful, accountable and actionable. It is imperative that all pledges include timelines for completion and measurable targets and indicators so that progress can be properly tracked.
5. Focus on the money needed to ensure all refugees have access to quality education. Opening education to all refugee children and including them in national education systems can be achieved at an estimated annual cost of US$4.85 billion globally.

Found this blog interesting? Read other recently published articles.

Source: Save The Children

RAMALLAH, 10 November 2023 – Attacks on hospitals and schools in Gaza where the UN says nearly one million civilians are sheltering must stop, Save the Children said on Friday following the bombardment of Gaza’s biggest hospital complex and three other hospitals.

Hospitals and health facilities in northern Gaza are housing thousands of patients but also more than a  hundred thousand of displaced people seeking shelter from airstrikes and fighting.

According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza as well as the attack on Al Shifa hospital on Friday morning, three other hospitals were also hit including two children’s hospitals, al-Rantisi and al-Nasser, and the Indonesian Hospital, damaged by overnight explosions. The attack on the Al Shifa hospital is the latest in a series of reported strikes on or near the facility in Gaza City in recent days. 

The UN has reported that more than half of the hospitals in Gaza and nearly two-thirds of primary health care facilities are no longer functioning, with little fuel to power generators, medical supplies or clean water, putting at risk at least 2,000 cancer patients and 130 newborn infants in incubators. 

Even before 7 October, Gaza’s health ministry had warned that the lives of 1,100 kidney failure patients, including 38 children, were at risk due to a lack of fuel and an acute shortage of medical supplies needed for dialysis.

Hundreds of thousands of people sheltering in schools have also faced violence, with over 50% of Gaza’s education facilities hit by Israeli airstrikes. An UNRWA school was bombedon 8 November, resulting in many injuries among the internally displaced persons sheltering there,  and Israeli airstrikes damaged four UN-run schools in refugee camps across the Gaza Strip over 24 hours last week. 

At least 100 UN workers have been killed since the start of hostilities, making this the deadliest ever round of violence for UN aid workers globally. Gaza’s Ministry of Health says more than 11,000 people have been killed in the bombardment.

Jason Lee, Save the Children’s Country Director in the occupied Palestinian territory, said:

 

“Hospitals and schools cannot be battlegrounds, and children cannot be targets. Yet in Gaza all three are attacked on a daily basis. Hospitals and schools shelter patients, displaced people, health and education personnel, who all need to be protected. The continued, systematic assaults must end. Even during wartime, basic elements of humanity must prevail.“

Attacks on schools and hospitals are considered a grave violation against children by the UN and may amount to violations of International Humanitarian Law. Save the Children is calling for an immediate ceasefire. The International Community should ensure that an immediate, independent investigation of the attack takes place and that perpetrators are held to account

Save the Children have been providing essential services and support to Palestinian children impacted by the ongoing conflict since 1953. Save the Children’s team in the occupied Palestinian territory has been working around the clock, prepositioning vital supplies to support people in need, and working to find ways to get assistance into Gaza.  

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For media inquiries please contact our media out of hours (GMT) contact: media@savethechildren.org.uk / +44(0)7831 650409

Please also check our Twitter account @Save_GlobalNews for news alerts, quotes, statements and location Vlogs.

Source: Save The Children

Brothers Rajendar and Laxman sit outside their destroyed home. Photo by Durga Tiwari/Save the Children. More content available here

Content available here

KATHMANDU, 10 November 2023 – Thousands of children in remote northwestern Nepal will spend the five-day Festival of Lights in darkness this year after a 6.4 magnitude earthquake destroyed their homes and cut power supplies, Save the Children said. 

About 250,000 people – half of them children – have been affected by the earthquake and following aftershocks that struck Jajarkot and Rukum West, about 500km (310 miles) west of Kathmandu, on 3 November, according to the National Emergency Operation Centre. Over 60,000 houses have been destroyed or damaged, forcing families to sleep in tents. 

For many families this will mean no celebrations to mark ‘Tihar’, the Festival of Lights. Families are struggling just to stay warm as  temperatures  drop, with some children  using straw for warmth as there are not enough blankets and warm clothes, said Save the Children.  

Rajendar, 16, is now living in a tent close to the ruins of his family home. He told Save the Children: 

“I lost my mother, my two brothers and my house to the earthquake. There is no festival, no lights for us. What will I do now, where will we go? We have lost everything.”  

The government said 82 children – more than half of the total fatalities – were killed in the earthquake. That also caused landslides in the mountainous region, making it difficult for the much-needed aid and food to get through to the remote villages.    

Rajendar’s older brother, 19-year-old Laxman, is worried about the future of his family. The earthquake shattered lives and livelihoods. He will be returning to India for work soon.

Sapana, 15, will be spending the Tihar festival in the bitter cold. The tent she shares with her family provides little warmth as temperatures continue to drop. She said:  

“This Tihar, there will be no song and dance. I lost many of my friends. We don’t have clean water; people are falling sick because of the cold. Our schools are destroyed, books buried inside the houses, and we are forced to stay in this tent. I can’t help but worry about myself and my parents.”   

Save the Children, in collaboration with partners and local authorities, has so far supported more than 700 households with shelters, blankets, baby and hygiene kits and cooking utensils. The aid organisation has also built temporary toilets and washing facilities for women and is working with partners to broadcast messages on how to cope with aftershocks and raising public awareness about protecting children from harm.  Next steps will include providing winter tents and temporary learning centres to replace destroyed and damaged schools.  

Heather Campbell, Country Director for Save the Children Nepal, said:  

“Children in Jajarkot and Rukum West have never experienced a disaster on this scale. They have no idea what the future holds for them. They don’t know if they will have a home again or if their parents will be able to earn money to support them. This is a very worrying time for thousands of vulnerable children.  

“Sadly, disasters can lead to an increase in cases of child abuse, including violence and even trafficking. Children need our protection. They need  pyschosocial support, safe spaces and places to learn to help them start the long and difficult process of rebuilding their lives. The dropping temperatures are increasing the risk of children contracting pneumonia. A temporary shelter is no substitute for a home. There is an acute shortage of tents, blankets and warm clothes. Our teams on the ground have seen families using straw to try to keep themselves warm.  

“Children are vulnerable to water borne diseases like diarrhea. We’ve seen outbreaks of disease in Jajarkot before, so we need to urgently increase the number of toilets and washing facilities.”   

Save the Children has worked in Nepal since 1976, in programmes spanning child protection, child rights governance, education, climate change, gender equality, health and nutrition, child poverty, and humanitarian. 

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Multimedia content available here : Save the Children – Search Result (contenthubsavethechildren.org)

We have spokespeople available in Nepal.

For media inquiries please contact:  

media@savethechildren.org.uk or +44(0)7831 650409;

GMU@savethechildren.org;

Rachel Thompson, Rachel.Thompson@savethechildren.org

Source: Save The Children

Eight-month-old Abei* being screened for pneumonia by the use of a bead necklace. Photo: Save the Children 

NAIROBI, 9 November 2023 – An innovative bead necklace is revolutionising the detection and treatment of pneumonia for children living in remote areas of Kenya, saving nearly 200 lives this year,  Save the Children said ahead of World Pneumonia Day on 12 November.

This low cost solution to the biggest infectious killer for children aged under five helps to bridge a healthcare gap, offering a glimmer of hope in Turkana County, in north-western Kenya, where access to health care facilities and medical supplies are limited.

Save the Children’s “Beads by Breath” project has facilitated the diagnosis, treatment, or referral to health clinics, for 198 children suffering with pneumonia this year. Community health volunteers use beads to count and detect rapid breath intake which is an early warning sign for the disease.

Pneumonia, which can be prevented with vaccines, and easily treated with low-cost antibiotics if properly diagnosed, is one of Kenya’s leading causes of death in children under five years, killing an estimated 7,500 children under-five in 2021 – or nearly one child every hour[1].

Ekitela*, a community health volunteer from Loima sub-county, serves 64 households in his village. He explained that the biggest health problems his community is grappling with now are  fast breathing, coughing and malaria:

“Pneumonia is a very dangerous disease. It can kill a child very fast. If a child goes for four days with fast breathing, his or her condition could get worse very quickly and we can lose the child.

“I think the problem we have is that most mothers here are still giving birth at home because hospitals are located far from the villages. This is a big risk for babies and could lead to babies developing fast breathing or other diseases.”

Ekitela* and other community health workers use two distinct sets of necklace beads: one with red and black beads designed for children aged one to five years, and another featuring green and red beads for children aged up to 12 months.

The 60-bead necklaces comprise of 49 green beads and 11 red for children under one and 21 red beads and 39 black beads for children aged one to five. This is based on the respiratory rates of these age groups, as children under one exceeding 49 breaths per minute are considered to have pneumonia while 39 breaths a minute is the level for children between one and five years.

Ewoi*, 47, lives with his wife and five children in Turkana. Ewoi* is the primary breadwinner for the family and his livestock is the only source of livelihood for his family. However, recent back-to-back droughts have decimated his herd of 150 goats and sheep, leaving only five goats. He told Save the Children that the five goats hardly produce any milk for his children and would not fetch a good price if he were to sell them.

Coupled with this, Ewoi’s two-month-old daughter, Akiru*, was diagnosed with pneumonia in October after Ewoi rushed her to the community health volunteer with a cold and a wheezing chest.

“The illness that started as a cold worsened until the child was admitted in the referral hospital. She has been sick for six weeks,” Ewoi said.“The child had a cold, and I could hear a sound coming from her chest while breathing. She was not breastfeeding well either. I could tell my daughter was not well.”

Akiru* is now recovering at home and proof that simple, low-cost interventions such as a bead necklace can make a huge difference for children.

Save the Children’s Country Director for Kenya and Madagascar, Yvonne Arunga, said:

“Many children in Kenya and around the world are facing increased risks from the biggest infectious killer for children: pneumonia. Yet, we have the vaccine, low-cost antibiotics and simple innovations such as the bead necklace to make sure no child dies from preventable diseases such as pneumonia.

“Every child deserves a healthy start in life. Policymakers should take deliberate and targeted actions to ensure that children not only survive beyond their fifth birthdays but thrive and reach their full potential. With the right policies and adequate funding, we can initiate solutions that will change the course of history and save the lives of millions of children.”

In 2016, Save the Children launched the “Beads by Breath” project with partners and the Kenyan government to help tackle pneumonia by training community health volunteers, most of whom lack basic education, to screen for fast breathing among children.

Save the Children has trained and equipped nearly 250 community health volunteers with skills to screen and provide critical care to children under five. These volunteers have been hailed as “village doctors” by the community and have gained the trust of local mothers, who rely on them whenever their children appear ill. Additionally, they conduct regular home visits to screen children for malnutrition, pneumonia, and to provide treatment for malaria and diarrheal diseases.

Save the Children has been providing support to children in Kenya since 1950. The aid agency works with communities, local partners, and the government to design and deliver programmes to meet the needs of the most deprived children. Save the Children operates programmes in health and nutrition, food security and livelihoods, child protection, child rights governance, education, and adolescent rights.

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Multimedia content for this release can be found here: www.contenthubsavethechildren.org/Package/2O4C2S3ODX9K

Notes to editor:

[1] Based on most recent (2021) child deaths data from the UN Inter-agency group for child mortality estimation. In Kenya, 14% of child deaths are linked to Pneumonia – 2019: Pneumonia in Children Statistics – UNICEF DATA. This translates to an estimated 7500 children dying of pneumonia in 2021 or nearly one child every hour.  

 

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For further enquiries please contact:

Please also check our Twitter account @Save_GlobalNews for news alerts, quotes, statements and location Vlogs.

 

Source: Save The Children

MEXICO CITY, 8 November 2023 – Thousands of families in southwest Mexico are without food and water two weeks after a massive hurricane took the country by surprise and about 185,000 children are out of school, with rebuilding expected to take at least 10 years, Save the Children said.

The resort towns of Acapulco and the village of Coyuca de Benitez have been declared natural disaster areas after being battered by Hurricane Otis on 25 October, the strongest storm ever to hit Mexico’s Pacific coast with winds of 165 mph (270km/h). More than 48 people are confirmed dead and 48 missing, with scientists blaming climate change and rising sea temperatures for the rapid intensification in less than 12 hours from a tropical storm to a hurricane.

With no time to prepare, more than 250,000 families – or up to 1 million people – were impacted in the province of Guerrero, one of the poorest states in the country, with bridges and roads destroyed, and more than 1,000 schools damaged, according to government figures. More than 90% of buildings in the area were damaged and power supplies cut.

Children have told Save the Children that they lost everything, including their homes, their schools and their toys, fleeing with just the clothes they were wearing. Many have ended up living in shelters and are resorting to bathing in local streams and rivers. Some reportedly have only had cookies to eat.

“I had a really hard time, a tree fell on the house … we went into a room to protect ourselves, the rain was pushing the door. We put a sofa and a bed to close the door, so that all the water would not enter. That’s the only way we were saved. I have no clothes anymore. I would like to go back to school, but for now, we can’t,” said 11-year-old Miguel whose family has now received food kits from Save the Children.

“We are not going to school. Our notebooks are wet and our backpacks are already burned because they are no longer useful. We don’t have food, water or shelter. We need a bed, pillows, and sheets. We don’t have anything to draw with. We have very few toys,” said Nayeli, 7.

Local authorities have vowed to resume classes where possible on 13 November in schools that did not suffer significant damage although some schools are now housing people who lost their homes. Many schools, however, have been completely wrecked, with roofs teared off, windows smashed, and filled with trees and mud.

Fatima Andraca, director of Humanitarian Response for Save the Children in Mexico, said they had met families in more remote areas who had not received any food or water since Hurricane Otis hit due to trees and debris blocking roads. Streets in Coyuca are still full of rubble and houses that are still standing are full of mud, fallen trees and dead animals, which threaten to be a source of infection for children.

Save the Children is supplying food, drinking water, hygiene and sanitation kits, and setting up safe spaces for children. In addition to the urgent supplies, Save the Children will be partnering with the authorities over the next 18 months to re-establish educational services, rebuild homes, support with water and sanitation solutions, and assist with employment and livelihood alternatives so families can recover.

Andraca said many schools had been completely destroyed:

“We are concerned about the condition of the schools. They are learning and safe places, where children can learn and play, and they are an important part of the resilience process after the catastrophe. However, it is very hard for many of them to be able to reopen soon, especially those that are in the mountainous area of Acapulco.

“We need to do everything we can to get children back to school as soon as possible so they can resume learning and be with their children in a safe, protected environment.”

Save the Children has been working in Mexico since 1973 with health and nutrition, education, and protection programmes for children. In 2019, Save the Children Mexico received the National Civil Protection Award for its humanitarian work and support to communities affected by earthquakes that struck Mexico City, Morelos, Puebla and Oaxaca in 2017.

ENDS

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