Cooking shouldn’t kill. It’s a simple premise, yet every year more than 4 million people die from exposure to household air pollution from cooking over open fires or traditional cookstoves. Girls and women often spend hours collecting and carrying heavy loads of wood and other fuels for cooking. And the smoke from traditional cookstoves contributes to the growing threat of climate change. This is one of public health’s greatest challenges – and solving it is […]

As we begin to see some progress in the fight against Ebola in Liberia, the country hardest-hit by the outbreak, more details are now available about Ebola’s spread to neighboring Mali. Initially, a 2-year-old girl imported the virus from Guinea to Mali and sadly died of the disease on October 24. All 118 people believed to have come into contact with her have now passed the 21-day period without developing symptoms. However, the virus was

The ongoing Ebola outbreak in West Africa is unprecedented, with over 14,000 cases so far and a mortality rate up to 70%. While we are making some progress, we have a lot of work to do. Bringing the outbreak under control depends on quickly finding people with Ebola and isolating them during treatment so they cannot infect others. However, identifying cases of Ebola requires a good diagnostic test, and the current tests are cumbersome, slow, and complex.

Today, November 25, is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, and a good time to reflect on the many extended ramifications of gender based violence, quite apart from such violence being bad and unacceptable in and of itself. A recent World Health Organization report for example trawls the data to come up with some appallingly high global and regional estimates of the levels of such violence and sobering figures on the

November 25 is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. Today, one in three women around the world experience some form of physical or sexual violence. This is not only a threat to women’s overall health and safety, but also to their ability to pursue an education, earn an income, and be equal participants in society. At its core, violence against women is a human rights issue that both men and women

The international community’s response must continue to be “fluid, nimble, and regional,” Ambassador Samantha Power, the U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, told the UN Security Council on Friday, November 21 at a meeting on Peace and Security in Africa. She recalled the unprecedented Security Council resolution on Ebola that was signed in September and remarked that now, two months later, “We are beginning to see the impact of the international community’s collective response.”

“We need to eradicate apathy.” – United Nations Foundation Founder and Chairman Ted Turner From the environmental movement to the civil rights movement, history has long been shaped by individual citizens standing up and standing together. This #GivingTuesday on December 2, citizens from around the world will celebrate giving and take action to create change in their communities. The UN Foundation is a founding partner of #GivingTuesday, a global day to “get out the give,”

By Guest Blogger:  Lindsey Horvath, community activist in Los Angeles and a Global Coordinator for the V-Day One Billion Rising Campaign. One in three. That’s how many women will face some form of violence in their lifetime. As we recognize the International Day for Elimination of Violence against Women this week, we will likely hear tragic stories of physical battering, sexual assault, emotional or psychological abuse, and financial abuse, which are some of the most common forms of

#GivingTuesday is around the corner on December 2, and to get inspired, we created a list of five of our favorite quotes from leaders and supporters of the United Nations on giving and how individuals can make a difference. 1. “Donations of time or money; volunteer engagement in one’s own community or on the other side of the world; acts of caring and kindness with no thought of recompense; these and other expressions of global