News

July 13, 2010

Why Protests Aren't What We Should Remember About the G8, Huffington Post

Why Protests Aren't What We Should Remember About the G8

By Liya Kebede

Among news of protests and arrests at the G8 summit, something important was overlooked - critical progress towards saving mothers' lives. During this meeting of the world's top leaders, mothers were finally at the top of the agenda. Almost every death resulting from childbirth is preventable yet politicians have historically shown little will to save these women's lives. Last weekend, the G8 leaders proved otherwise with a $5 billion commitment to maternal health. Not only is this great news for women across the globe, but essential for the health of their children and the future economic development of their communities.

The G8 commitment was not everything we had hoped for, but it was a critical first step. It, combined with pledges from other donors, will prevent 64,000 women from dying in childbirth and save the lives of 1.3 million young children. Yet, even with last week's pledge, millions of women and children still need help. We have the power to stamp out maternal mortality altogether, and we must do it.

Today, 350,000 women die each year -- nearly a woman every minute -- from survivable pregnancy and childbirth complications. Preventable maternal mortality remains one of the leading causes of death for women in the developing world. And for every woman who dies, 20 more will suffer terrible, life-altering complications.

Since 2000, we've made great strides toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals, but Goal #5, the promise to reduce maternal mortality by 75 percent by 2015, remains the furthest behind. Without at least $30 billion to make proven solutions available to all women, only 23 countries are on track to meet the MDG 5 goal.

In addition to not reaching millions of women in need, the G8 pledge lacks specific details about how to fill the 3.5 million health worker gap. Midwives and doctors play a crucial role preventing unnecessary maternal deaths. They educate women about nutrition, health and family planning. And they step in when complications arise. We should work to guarantee that there is a midwife or health worker by every woman's side during childbirth.

In Ethiopia -- where I was born -- most women still give birth alone. Medical facilities are often too far away, overcrowded or under-equipped to help them. Across Africa, dedicated health workers like the doctors at the Durame Hospital in Ethiopia struggle to serve too many with too little. The nurses, midwives and doctors at these hospitals are superheroes -- they work tirelessly to save lives every day -- but they cannot do it alone. With funding from the G8 and G20 countries, we can support these hospitals and set up clinics to serve isolated communities. For many women and children, especially those with health complications, this would mean the difference between life and death.

The summit also failed to hold our leaders accountable for the $50 billion in additional development aid by 2010 they promised at Gleneagles. With worldwide budget crises, it is all too tempting to cut aid or renege on pledges. We must ensure the extra $5 billion pledged by the G8 does not come at the expense of other health and development programs. In times of economic crisis, we can't afford not to invest in solutions that save lives, such as health workers, health facilities and family planning. When a mother dies, it not only devastates her family, it reduces economic growth, destabilizes communities and jeopardizes hard won progress.

There is a way forward that will save lives and build a better future. Past promises must be kept and donors must be clear about their individual contributions to the initiative. Canada has already pledged $1.1 billion, and the U.S. $1.35 billion. Now, other countries must follow their example.

Bringing the future generation into the world should not cost you your life. But without real, sustained commitment from our leaders, our health care workers, and each of us, becoming a mother will still be the most dangerous day of many women's lives. So thank you to the G8 for this important first step. We still have a long way to go.

July 02, 2010

"Star of Africa", Guardian UK

By Eva Wiseman, Guardian UK

June 13, 2010

She was one of the world's biggest fashion models and the first black face of Estée Lauder. But when Liya Kebede returned home to Ethiopia and saw the chronic problems of maternal health her career took a new turn. Her campaign continues – and now she has set her sights on sustainable fashion.

Flicking through Liya Kebede's pile of fashion magazine covers passes a calm and perfumed afternoon. In 2002, French Vogue declared May was "All About Liya" month, dedicating a whole issue to the African supermodel after the editor saw her in Tom Ford's Gucci catwalk show. Describing the day they first met, Ford recalls: "She looked me in the eyes, and I was quite literally stunned. Liya projects an aura of goodness and calm that outshines even her extraordinary physical beauty. Later in the day," Ford continues, "when trying to remember what she looked like, I could only remember her eyes."

Born 32 years ago in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia's capital, Kebede was spotted twice. The first time, as a teenager, took her to Paris, where she failed, homesick. When she returned to Ethiopia, she met her husband, a hedge-fund manager 20 years her senior, and it wasn't until the second time, aged 23 in Chicago, where the couple had set up home, that it stuck. In no time Kebede signed a £1.65m contract to become the first black face of Estée Lauder; her face and long, generous limbs sold underwear, handbags, evening dresses and Tiffany diamonds. She took a role in a Robert De Niro film, she was named 11th in a Forbes list of the world's top-earning models, she had a son and a daughter, Suhul and Raee, then in 2005 she took a breath…

We speak as she dashes through Manhattan between meetings. Taxis honk and men yell as she quietly talks about her childhood, growing up under "vast blue skies". She describes the "beautiful, raw land", the space. And then the way that New York shook her up, "the way it does everyone". It was when she returned to Ethiopia from the USA, where pregnancy is so celebrated, that she became involved in raising awareness of her home country's maternal health crisis. In Ethiopia a mother dies in childbirth every minute, leaving her baby 10 times less likely to survive past the age of two.

"There's a saying in Africa: To find out you are pregnant is to have one foot in the grave," she says. "Every time I go back home I'm introduced to women who've barely made it."

Her soft accent leaps from drawl to drawl as she remembers meeting an elderly woman who, after her daughter died giving birth to her third child, was forced to bring up her grandchildren alone. "She couldn't afford food, let alone schools, so the baby was given away. It was such a tragedy – not only did she lose her daughter but the whole family was destroyed. When, in an African community like that, a mother dies, it affects everyone."

In 2006 she set up the Liya Kebede Foundation. Her mission was to reduce maternal, newborn and child mortality in Ethiopia, and around the world. Funding advocacy and awareness-raising projects, as well as providing direct support for community-based education and training, the foundation's success led to her recognition by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Leader. While Kebede's aims are ambitious, she's particularly good at promoting the small, gentle steps towards life-changing aid. She talks, for instance, about the importance of providing torches to villages in developing countries, to light midwives' paths to the houses of women with no electricity, but she's clear, too, that there's no small solution to a global problem. "In these villages there are no roads, let alone hospitals. The last time I visited, I was told about a local woman who started bleeding halfway through delivering her child. The whole village carried her to hospital, but she died on the way." These are preventable deaths, she stresses.

Vogue May 2009 Cover

June 27, 2010

4,738 Letters for Mothers' Lives and Counting!

Our campaign to support maternal health funding is working! More than 3,000 letters have already been sent to Congress, encouraging them to support funding that saves mothers’ lives. But, in tough economic times, we need every possible voice to keep this vital funding alive.

Please send your message to Congress today.

June 17, 2010

Open Letter to G8 Leaders

June 2010

Open letter to all G8 Leaders - being issued in all G8 countries

It is a global scandal that millions of women and newborn babies die or suffer severe injury during childbirth every year – despite the fact that the vast majority of these injuries and deaths are preventable.

99% of these deaths are in the developing world, devastating families, communities and societies. Until they stop there can be no real progress in tackling global poverty.

This is a human rights crisis demanding immediate action.

The international community has promised action, Millennium Development Goal 4 and 5 aim to reduce child deaths by two thirds and maternal deaths by three quarters by 2015, yet it’s these goals that have made the least progress and we still have a very, very long way to go in making them happen.

This year's G8 has an opportunity to change this once and for all. We, the undersignedi, call on our G8 leaders to commit to:

1. Double international aid for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health.

And use this additional funding to:

2. Recruit, train and deploy additional skilled health workers to fill the shortfall of 2.5 million health professionals and 1 million community health workers.

3. Remove barriers of access to health care, with services for women and children being free at the point of use where countries choose to provide it.

This should be done within international commitments to sexual and reproductive health and rights such as access to information and family planning.

Increased investment could save the lives each year of approximately 1 million additional children and between 200,000-330,000 women.

The G8 must put its leadership squarely behind the UN Secretary General and make an ambitious contribution to a concrete plan of action to accelerate progress towards the Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5.

Signed:

Liya Kebede, Founder and President, Liya Kebede Foundation,

Ai Tominaga,

Angelique Kidjo,

Annie Lennox,

Claudia Winkleman,

Celine Dion,

Davina McCall,

Diana Quick,

Jarvis Church,

Jermain Jenas,

Dame Judi Dench,