UN Foundation Malaria Partnership
|
|
On April 1, 2008, UN Foundation Chairman Ted Turner joined leaders of the United Methodist Church and Lutheran World Relief to announce a new faith-based initiative aimed at eliminating malaria deaths within a generation. We, with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, will help lead efforts by the Lutherans and Methodists to mobilize their followers and raise up to $200 million through efforts including:
- Educating and mobilizing the UMC and LWR’s combined, global constituency of more than 20 million people concerned about malaria and related diseases of poverty;
- Working in partnership with the Global Fund to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria (set up through the leadership of former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan);
- Supporting malaria prevention and health-system strengthening efforts; and
- Advancing the churches’ on-the-ground health missions.
United Methodists have been in mission around the globe, including Africa, for more than 160 years. With over 9 million members in the United States and 12 million worldwide, United Methodists are reaching the most impoverished and remote regions, building universities, hospitals and clinics, and staffing, operating and resourcing critical health delivery systems.
Lutheran World Relief is the humanitarian relief agency for both major U.S.-based Lutheran Church bodies, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) and the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS), which together comprise a constituency of 8 million in the U.S. and 70 million worldwide. The Lutheran Church’s international initiatives are rooted in ending poverty and providing integrated, holistic and long-term approaches to solve individual and global problems.
We will provide staff support and expertise in public education, advocacy, resource mobilization and constituency building. We will also help link the churches’ ongoing mission work with efforts by the Global Fund and the overall global framework for eliminating malaria deaths put in place by the UN and its partners.
