Shot@Life - An opportunity to save someone’s life

An opportunity to save someone’s life

July 3, 2012 BY Ashley Cissokho

Did you know 1.5 million kids die every year from diseases that could easily be prevented with vaccines? I didn’t.

It’s a sad, strange statistic, especially when you consider the easy access we in the United States have to vaccines.

The other day, I went to an event called a GAVI Global Tea Party in New York City hosted by Denise Paredes and there I learned more about the very real issue of children’s immunization in developing countries.

The GAVI Alliance is a partnership that brings together organizations such as UNICEF, the World Health Organization, World Bank, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the UN Foundation.

The GAVI Global Tea Party idea was started by Jennifer Burden of World Moms Blog as a way to spread awareness about the vaccine issue.

During the party we watched a film about a woman from Nicaragua who lost her baby daughter to pneumonia.

It was a heartbreaking story but what made it even worse was the fact that if her country had had better access to vaccines there’s a good chance that her daughter could have lived.

The fact is that even at our worst we in the U.S. are still more fortunate than so many other countries.

The vaccines, that as kids we dreaded getting, are not available to many kids in developing countries and the availability of these vaccines could mean life or death for them.

President of MOMentum Holly Pavlika discussed her trip to Tanzania for Shot@Life and told how grateful the people there are for resources that we for the most part take for granted.

Attending this event not only furthered my awareness of the issues that go on outside our country but motivated me to want to spread the word about this issue.

I know that during hard times like this, we have a tendency to want to focus on what’s going on within our own country and community, but it’s important for us to remember that we’re all a part of the human race.

When there’s an opportunity to save someone’s life – prevent not just illness but the emotional pain a mother faces when she loses her child – then we should take that opportunity and make a difference.

POSTED IN: Global Health, Partners, Supporters

Comments

Submitted by ASHLEY on: July 17, 2012 Hi raj, I didn't know either. It's amazing how any kind of effort can make a big impact.i

Submitted by ASHLEY on: July 17, 2012 Thanks Jennifer ! I was really inspired by the information that I learned at the tea party. Thanks so much for inviting me. I havé just finished doing a one week work experience at GAVI and have learned so much. I hope to figure out a way to get other people my age involved and see how we can make a difference.

Submitted by raja on: July 14, 2012 I didn't think it was so easy to do great things as help saving children lives!

Submitted by Jennifer Burden @WorldMomsBlog on: July 6, 2012 Ashley -- I am so inspired that coming to our NYC GAVI Global Tea Party motivated you to write such a great post to help save the lives of children. You are a very talented and motivated teenager!