Last week RESULTS activists participated in the latest of our ‘Back to basics’ focus calls looking at the Millennium Development Goals. We covered the history of the MDGs, what the eight MDGs are and the progress made towards them. We also looked at some of the limitations of the MDGs and how we have used the MDGs as a framework of our advocacy work.
If you weren’t able to participate in the call you can now listen to a recording here.
January’s RESULTS conference call will focus on reviewing progress toward the MDGs, and looking at why different goals are closer than others to achievement. We will be launching an exciting new campaign on finance for the MDGs – and this recording will give you a great preparation.
At a high-level roundtable meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Microfinance/Microcredit (APPG-MF) on the 10 December the Department for International Development (DFID) opened a consultation on the design of a major new capacity-building fund for microfinance in Africa. This is currently being designed at DFID in partnership with the World Bank. You can now view the minutes of the meeting at the APPG’s website.
DFID have just released a concept note, which outlines the rationale, approaches and activities that are proposed for the fund. Further consultations are ongoing with microfinance institutions and other bodies, and RESULTS will be preparing a response to the concept note for feedback to DFID. If you have any comments that you would like to be incorporated into this response we would really like to hear them at julia@results-uk.org
From 7-9am on Saturday 2nd January Radio 4’s Today programme is handing the editorial reins to Baroness Shirley Williams, who will be investigating the pros and cons of a ‘Tobin Tax’ on international currency transactions.
Currency transaction levies are potentially a major new source of funding for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and RESULTS is currently campaigning for the UK government to set up a currency transaction levy (CTL) on Sterling to fund the MDGs that relate to health. You can read more about the campaign on our website, and there is an explanation of what the CTL is and how it would work here.
This week the World Health Organization (WHO) released updated data to compliment their 2009 Global Tuberculosis Control Report released on World TB Day. The earlier report released in March contained dramatic new data showing rates of TB-HIV co-infection twice as high as originally estimated.
UNITAID, the international finance mechanism for drugs to treat HIV, tuberculosis and malaria, has given the go-ahead for a patent pool for antiretroviral drugs, a mechanism to promote wider licensing of patented drugs to generic manufacturers, in order to lower the cost of treatment. Keep reading →
Ingrid Munroe, talks about how microfinance and the institution she founded, Jamii Bora, empowers the impoverished by giving them the opportunity to prosper through their own entrepreneurial spirit.
Ingrid’s powerful message is “everybody can get themselves out of poverty with their own efforts”.
Today the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Microfinance/Microcredit, for which RESULTS UK hosts the Secretariat, held a high-level roundtable meeting on ‘Harnessing the power of microfinance in Africa: challenges and opportunities’. Joining us in a Committee Room in the Houses of Parliament were leaders from a range of stakeholders in microfinance. The meeting was chaired by Robert Syms, MP for Poole, and addressed by Francis Pelekamoyo, former Governor of the Reserve Bank of Malawi and Chair of Opportunity International Africa; Gareth Thomas MP, Minister of State for International Development; and Anton Simanowitz, a leading academic working on microfinance.
Gareth Thomas outlined exciting new plans from the Department for International Development (DFID) for a ‘multi-donor capacity-building fund for microfinance’, which will provide significant new resources for expanding access to financial services in Africa. The facility is currently being designed by DFID and is also supported by the World Bank. Keep reading →
RESULTS UK are delighted to announce that Lucy Chesire, one of our ACTION partners from Kenya, and long time friend of RESULTS, has been acknowledged for her extraordinary commitment to raising awareness of TB internationally. At the opening ceremony of the IUATLD conference in Mexico on Friday night, Lucy was presented the Stop TB Partnership and Kochon Foundation ‘Kochon prize’ for extraordinary achievements in combating TB.
Lucy learned she was HIV-positive in 1992 and was the first female health professional in Kenya to publicly acknowledge her status. In 2000 she was diagnosed with TB and faced surgery and hospital treatment to overcome the disease. Since her recovery she has committed her life to raising awareness of the disease, and has become a leading advocate on TB and TB-HIV issues.
Lucy has worked closely with RESULTS UK since 2005 when she first came to the UK to support our efforts to educate decision-makers about the importance of fighting TB and TB-HIV. She has since visited the UK on a number of occasions and has been invited to give evidence to the UK’s Select Committee on International Development in recognition of her important role as a global health expert and ambassador.
Lucy has also helped RESULTS UK to generate national media coverage about TB, appearing on Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour and authoring an editorial for the Guardian, to give just two examples.
In her speech, Lucy humbly accepted the award on behalf of all those affected by TB, and urged all those attending the conference to step up efforts to fight the disease, so that millions more lives can be saved. Lucy shares the 2009 Kochen Prize with Professor Stewart Cole, Director of the Global Health Institute at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland. Professor Cole is responsible for groundbreaking research on Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the microorganism that causes TB.
For the past week ACTION Project Manager Kate Finch has been attending the International Union against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (IUATLD) Conference in Mexico. This annual conference brings together stakeholders from around the world working in the areas of TB and lung health. This year’s conference ‘Poverty and Lung Health’ aimed to take further steps to address some of the specific health challenges facing millions of people living in poverty.
Although the delivery of health services to those most vulnerable often falls to the communities themselves, those communities need resources, including long term financial commitments from governments around the world. This commitment requires political will at both the local and international level, and parliamentarians have a key role to play in generating, and sustaining this political commitment.
The All Party Parliamentary Group on Global TB, supported by ACTION partners from around the world, held a workshop on Friday 4 December entitled ‘Engaging parliamentarians in the fight against TB’. Thirty conference participants attended the workshop and a follow up brainstorming session, which focused on providing civil society organisations practical strategies to increase awareness of TB amongst their members of parliament. Participants from Mexico, Peru, Nigeria, Sweden, Brazil, South Africa, Ukraine, US, UK, France, Cameroon, Canada and India shared successes as well as country specific challenges of working with parliamentarians. Participants were keen to learn and share their approaches to engage government, and alliances were formed for future collaboration at regional and local levels.
Kate commented that “there were many common challenges of working with MPs that were shared from countries from the UK to Peru, to India and Nigeria. However, what was really clear was that in those countries where TB is high on the political agenda, it is civil society that has a central role in putting it there and subsequently holding their MPs to account to deliver on their commitments.”
It is hoped that this workshop is a step in the creation of a network of parliamentary TB champions around the world who can advocate alongside their civil society partners for greater political commitment in the fight against TB.
Today at the British Thoracic Society’s (BTS) winter conference a new report was launched that describes how the NHS is responding to the TB situation in England – where there were nearly 8,000 cases in 2008.
The report is based on an extensive survey of 112 Primary Care Trusts across England. It follows up from an earlier survey and corresponding report published in 2007, and highlights the progress that has been made as well as the gaps that still exist in England’s TB response.
Marc Lipman of the BTS commented: “The survey highlights some encouraging and real progress in the funding, planning and delivery of NHS services to tackle TB – but we’ve got some way to go yet. In the 1970s we possibly became a little too complacent about TB. We should never make that mistake again.” Keep reading →
This week the World Health Organization (WHO) released updated data to compliment their 
RESULTS UK are delighted to announce that Lucy Chesire, one of our 
Lucy has worked closely with RESULTS UK since 2005 when she first came to the UK to support our efforts to educate decision-makers about the importance of fighting TB and TB-HIV. She has since visited the UK on a number of occasions and has been invited to give evidence to the UK’s Select Committee on International Development in recognition of her important role as a global health expert and ambassador.
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