Nobel Laureates and Global Leaders Call for Urgent Action to Prevent COVID-19 Child Rights Disaster

Regina Njagi’s four children, aged between 11 and 17, have not benefitted from online learning since the COVID-19 led to the closure of all schools in Kenya, earlier in March. With the closure, Njagi lost her job as a teacher at a local private school.

Navigating Safely Through The Pandemic

Having reported on SARS, Ebola, Bird Flu (H5N1) outbreaks, as well as writing about efforts to combat HIV, I was horrified by what was going on in Wuhan, China last Jan mainly because of how fast this new SARS-CoV-2 virus spread. By early Feb it seemed likely there’d be a global pandemic and by the end of Feb I started to freak out as the pandemic took hold. I’ve never been to Wuhan or China nor seen anyone who had; and I hadn’t travelled any where recently. It was nearly impossible for me to have encountered the virus but that didn’t keep me from getting sick with fear and dread knowing that a goddamn microscopic parasite was going to turn our lives upside down when we already had multiple crisis of on our plate. (You know, climate, ecological collapse, rise of populism and authoritarianism.) I refused to write about the virus or the disease it causes — COVID-19 — until I had to face the little bastard personally.

Women’s access to stimulus packages and post Covid-19 gender equality

All crises—natural disasters, wars, pandemics—affect different sections of people in different ways. Like any other crisis, Covid-19 has differing impacts on society. It has affected men and women, rich and poor, and adults and children differently. Since the ramifications of the coronavirus pandemic vary across people, measures towards the recovery from this crisis should also be focused towards each section of society distinctively.

Technology Meets Creativity on Women’s Empowerment Platform

Eight years ago, at the age of eleven, Fuzia co-founder Riya Sinha decided to start a writing club for school girls. Stemming from this initiative a few years later Sinha, along with co-founder Shraddha Varma, decided to start the online platform for women. Their story and Fuzia's DNA are intrinsically wrapped around each other – and highlight how even in the age of feminism where women’s voices tend to be drowned out, a platform for them can become a global success.

South Sudan – COVID-19 and Ongoing Violence has Catastrophic Impact on Civilians

Large-scale intercommunal violence on civilians in the Jonglei and greater Pibor regions in South Sudan has led to the mass displacement of thousands of people who are living in the open without health care, adequate food, shelter, water or sanitation in the middle of the rainy season.

Trump Undermines WHO, UN System

After accusing the World Health Organization (WHO) of pro-China bias, President Donald Trump announced US withdrawal from the UN agency. Although the US created the UN system for the post-Second World War new international order, Washington has often had to struggle in recent decades to ensure that it continues to serve changing US interests.

World Bank’s ‘Mobilizing Finance for Development’ Not Financing Development

The World Bank leadership must urgently abandon its ‘Maximizing Finance for Development’ (MFD) hoax. Instead, it should resume its traditional multilateral development bank role of mobilizing funds at minimal cost to finance developing countries.

Transforming the Global Economy or Parachuting Cats into Borneo?

The COVID 19 Pandemic continues relentlessly. Deaths approaching a million globally, 22 million infected and growing. Brazil, India, the US and Russia accounting for almost 50% of the total cases in the world.

Tourism Trauma and COVID-19

Pandemic-related lockdowns, flight cancellations, and border closures may be putting a crimp on summer vacation plans. However, the precipitous drop in tourism will have an outsized impact on countries that rely on foreign travelers—with potentially large-scale effects on their economies’ national accounts.

Q&A: Ageing Africa Left out of COVID-19 Policies

Nearly three quarters of respondents in a survey across 18 African countries have claimed that their countries’ COVID-19 responses are gravely lacking in addressing the ageing population.

To Understand the ”Other”: How Disabilities Define Us

  You can shine your shoes and wear a suit you can comb your hair and look quite cute you can hide your face behind a smile one thing you can't hide is when you're crippled inside.                                                                                                               John Lennon

How Women & Girls are Forced to Trade Sex for Water

There is an intimate connection between corruption and COVID-19. This pandemic is making everyday life more desperate, especially in poorer communities, and that means more opportunities for those preying on vulnerable people.

Report Shows Sri Lanka has Escalation of Violence During COVID-19 Lockdown

The coronavirus pandemic has resulted in the escalation of violence against women and children in Sri Lanka.

Future of Education Is Here

There are moments when the world has no choice but to come together. Those moments become historic turning points. This is one of them. We are now faced with the greatest education emergency of our time. Over one billion children are out of school. The COVID-19 pandemic has created an unprecedented crisis of such magnitude and depth that the next generation might neither have the capacity and tools, nor the will, to rebuild - let alone build back better.

Call for Urgent Action by 275 World Leaders on Global Education Emergency In Face of Covid19

We write to call for urgent action to address the global education emergency triggered by COVID-19. With over 1 billion children still out of school because of the lockdown, there is now a real and present danger that the public health crisis will create a COVID generation who lose out on schooling and whose opportunities are permanently damaged. While the more fortunate have had access to alternatives, the world’s poorest children have been locked out of learning, denied internet access, and with the loss of free school meals - once a lifeline for 300 million boys and girls - hunger has grown.

ISDS Enables Making More Money from Losses

With the Covid-19 contagion from late 2019 spreading internationally this year, governments have responded, often in desperation. Meanwhile, predatory international law firms are encouraging multimillion-dollar investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) lawsuits citing Covid-19 containment, relief and recovery measures.

We Must Prioritize Local Solutions to Global Problems

World Humanitarian Day is the perfect time to refresh our push to localize humanitarian aid for COVID-19 and all the challenges we face. Celebrating #RealLifeHeroes!

Enough Is Not Enough – Call for Urgent Change in Mexican Economic Policy

A group composed by women and men, called Nuevo Curso de Desarrollo (New Course for Development) based at the National University of Mexico recently published a document to propose a set of measures to change the current economic policy in Mexico. This proposal responds to a diagnosis of the current situation: at this point of the year, the serious social damage inflicted by the health and economic crisis can already be observed. As we know, in Mexico as in many other countries, there was a great economic disruption caused by COVID. Millions of people ceased to receive income from their work. However, the Mexican government has not carried out sufficient support measures to compensate for these losses. The result is easy to guess: many households have been rapidly impoverished. It is estimated that between 10 and 16 million people in April earned much less to the point of not being able to acquire the basic food basket , a situation that has continued for many of them during May, June and July. And while it is true that more and more workers are returning to their jobs, the losses caused have not been repaired.

No More Lost Generations: Global Fund Provides Education for Children in Crisis

15-year-old Humaira* sits on the mud floor of her hut in Ukhiya camp, Cox's Bazar, listening as the rain beats down on the tarpaulin roof.

Keeping Education within the Grasp of Refugee Children

“Not being able to go to school is not something I’d wish on any child in this world,” said 21-year-old Nujeen Mustafa, a young advocate for refugees who fled the Syrian war with her sister. Mustafa, who now lives in Germany, is also the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR) high profile supporter.

Impending Food Crisis in Lebanon will Largely Affect Migrant Workers

Migrant workers and refugees in Lebanon will “inevitably” suffer the most as food insecurity threatens the nation following last week’s blast.