Turning Outrage into Action: Clay Aiken, UNICEF and the Children of Somalia

Clay Aiken laughs with children he met on a UNICEF field visit to northwest Somalia.

Photo by Nick Ysenburg, US Fund for UNICEF




BREAKING NEWS:

UNICEF Ambassador Clay Aiken has blogged about his recent visit to Somalia in a UNICEF FieldNote entitled "Where is the outrage?"

Somalia, a country of ten million located in the Horn of Africa, has been torn asunder by civil war for seventeen years. With no central government and few safe havens for those caught up in the conflict, it has been completely destabilized. Children, the most vulnerable, are among those most affected by these conditions.

Is that reason enough to be outraged?

Aiken says, in part:

...the lack of a permanent central government has contributed to Somalia's status as one of the poorest and most volatile countries in the world. Decades of civil conflict have shattered social structures and exacerbated poverty.

In such conditions—combined with an extremely arid environment and difficult terrain with settlements scattered over vast distances—a Somali child's chances of surviving to adulthood are among the lowest of children anywhere in the world.

One in every eight children do not survive to their fifth birthday, one of the highest rates of death among children in the world.

One in eight.

Is that reason enough to be outraged?

Major infectious diseases are rampant, contributing to a life expectancy of less than fifty years. There is a "very high" risk of food or waterborne diseases: bacterial and protozoal diarrhea, hepatitis A and E, and typhoid fever, and "high risks" of malaria and dengue fever. (Source: CBS News)

Nearly all of these conditions are preventable with sources of safe water, proper hygiene and improved nutrition, as well as medicines and vaccines that are readily available in the western world. Yet people, especially children, continue to die.

Is that reason enough to be outraged?

To make matters worse, aid workers and activists who are on the ground in Somalia working to improve people's lives are being targeted by insurgents, kidnapped and murdered. Many humanitarian aid organizations have been forced to withdraw from the country, but UNICEF is still there, serving the people of Somalia since 1972, at great risk to their own lives and safety. In the last few days alone, the chief of the Somalia office for the United Nations Development Program was shot dead, a fourth driver for the World Food Program was killed and a prominent Somali peace activist as murdered as he left morning prayer. (Source: AllAfrica.com)

Is that reason enough to be outraged?

Somaliland, the region of the country Aiken visited, is relatively safe when compared to the utter chaos that reigns throughout most of the country, and it is there where the success of UNICEF programs is most apparent. Aiken describes his visit to UNICEF-supported schools and hospitals, centers where girls learn leadership, life-skills and play sports, and UNICEF-supported maternal and child health clinics that offer nutritional feeding and immunization. These programs save lives.

Is that reason enough to turn outrage into action?

Go to the US Fund for UNICEF and read Clay Aiken's Somalia blog, "Where is the outrage?"

Then DONATE to support UNICEF's child survival programs in Somalia.

These UNICEF programs have been proven to be effective. They need to be supported and children need to survive while the monumental task of bringing peace to Somalia continues. If the children don't survive, what future does Somalia have?

Take action.






Technorati tags: Clay Aiken, UNICEF, Somalia, humanitarian crisis, US Fund for UNICEF, baby, children, education, Africa, war, food, health, sanitation, safe water, girls' empowerment, American Idol, child survival, orphan,child protection, HIV/AIDS

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