“Little children don’t have a voice, or any control over their own lives, which makes them vulnerable. The message that should resonate around the world is that we are all responsible for all of the children all of the time.”
– Anne Geddes
Anne Geddes has made a commitment to join United Nations Secretary-General’s Every Woman Every Child movement to help raise awareness about the need to improve the health of women and children in developing countries. Building on her current philanthropic activities and the charitable work of the Geddes Philanthropic Trust, Anne will now lend her voice and in select instances, her iconic imagery, to support Every Woman Every Child at key events hosted by the United Nations and Every Woman Every Child partners.
“Every ninety seconds around the world, a woman dies either in pregnancy or in childbirth,” said Anne Geddes. “And in ninety percent of these cases, the causes are preventable.”
Every Woman Every Child is an unprecedented global movementto save the lives of millions of women and children. Anne has joined Every Woman Every Child partners —individuals, philanthropists, governments, the business community, civil society and nongovernmental organizations (CSOs and NGOs), health care professionals, and academic and research institutions — in a pledge to advocate for action to reduce the preventable deaths of women and children. The movement’s goals include training more midwives, providing better family planning services, improving access to emergency obstetric care, extending access to life-saving vaccines, and preventing mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS.
Anne’s contributions and outreach in support of Every Woman Every Child thus far have included:
To further her commitment to Every Woman Every Child, Anne was honored to become a Global Advocate for the Shot@Life campaign, a movement which aims to save the lives of the thousands of children under five, who die every day from diseases that are entirely preventable by a simple vaccine. The campaign launched in early 2012, and Anne both attended and spoke at the launch alongside UN Foundation CEO Kathy Calvin, First Lady Rosalynn Carter and Ambassador Andrew Young.
“It breaks my heart — as I’m sure it does yours — to know that globally, thousands of small children die needlessly every day”, said Anne. “In fact this year 1.5 million children will die from diseases that have all but disappeared in developed countries.”
Shot@Life works to support the important work of the World Health Organization, UNICEF and the GAVI Alliance to continue to save lives and improve the health and welfare of children by providing vaccines for diseases such as measles, pneumonia, diarrhea and polio.
