I am excited to announce the launch of the fourth year of the Get a Shot. Give a Shot.® campaign in collaboration with Walgreens. For every flu shot or any immunization administered at Walgreens, the Healthcare Clinic at select Walgreens, and Duane Reade in New York now through August 31, 2017, Walgreens will donate the value of one lifesaving vaccine through the United Nations Foundation’s Shot@Life campaign (up to $2 million). To date, this partnership has […]

In just a few weeks, the world will come to New York for the opening of the next session of the UN General Assembly – what is often called “UN General Assembly week.” During this time, which takes place every September, the UN will convene leaders from heads of state to heads of companies to advance solutions to today’s global problems. As head of the UN Foundation’s New York office, this occasion is a reminder of both

On the margins of this year’s United Nations General Assembly, there are two key events focused on refugees that we’ll be watching closely as the world continues to grapple with the largest refugee crisis ever. The first is the UN Summit for Refugees and Migrants hosted by the President of the General Assembly on September 19 at UN Headquarters in New York City. The summit will bring the international community together to come up with

In August, I joined the United Nations Foundation’s Global Entrepreneurs Council, a group of leading entrepreneurs committed to finding innovative solutions to global problems, on a trip to Sweden and Jordan to learn how these countries are addressing the rising number of refugees coming into their borders and how private sector leaders can support refugees. Right now, more than 65 million people around the world have been forcibly displaced – the highest number ever recorded.

The Population Reference Bureau (PRB) in Washington, D.C. recently released its latest population size and population growth estimates. The global levels and trends that the fact sheet presents are a bit dizzying, as any figures with so many zeroes are. PRB estimates that there are 7.4 billion (that is, 7,400,000,000) people in the world today and this is projected to rise to 8.5 billion in 2030 and 9.9 billion in 2050. But it is the

In August, the United Nations Foundation’s Global Entrepreneurs Council visited Sweden and Jordan to learn more about how those countries are handling the refugee crisis and how entrepreneurs and private sector leaders can help support refugees. A major challenge for many refugees in Sweden is the absence of a social network – the friends, mentors, and acquaintances who can help them find jobs, provide support, and navigate life in a new country. This is an

The last 15 years saw significant progress in reducing childhood deaths – globally, the number of deaths fell from 12.7 million in 1990 to 6.3 million in 2013. Promisingly, this progress accelerated in recent years – from 1.2% per year during 1990–1995 to 4% during 2005–2013. The reduction of measles deaths by 79% since 2000 has been the single most important contributor to child mortality reduction under Millennium Development Goal 4. Despite these impressive gains,

On September 21, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is convening a special event at UN headquarters in New York to encourage countries to officially join the Paris Agreement on climate change, the first-ever universal international accord for climate change. You may recall that the Paris Agreement was first adopted by 195 nations in December of last year. The agreement was then signed at the UN on Earth Day this year by 175 countries at a ceremony that saw the