Global Action for Children

On October 28, 2009, Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT), along with Senators Richard Durbin (D-IL) and Bob Corker (R-TN), introduced the Global Child Survival Act (S. 1966), a piece of legislation aimed at reducing child mortality and improving child health worldwide.

Every day, 24,000 children under the age of five die around the world from causes that are mostly preventable and treatable. That’s 8.8 million children each year.

Pneumonia, treatable with 27 cents’ worth of antibiotics, accounts for almost one of every five deaths among children under age five each year. Diarrhea, treatable with six cents’ worth of oral rehydration salts, causes 17 percent of young children’s deaths. Measles, preventable with a vaccine that costs just 26 cents per dose, is among the top four child-killers worldwide. And more than one third of child deaths result from complications related to birth, a cluster of causes that includes tetanus, which is preventable with a $1.20 tetanus vaccine for the mother during pregnancy.

The Global Child Survival Act seeks to increase access to these services and improve child health worldwide by:
•Requiring the United States Government to develop an integrated strategy for reducing mortality and improving child health;
•Increasing coordination between U.S. agencies working on child survival;
•Establishing guidelines for child survival programs to encourage strengthening of local capacity, partnerships with non-governmental organizations, coordination with other donors, and more.

This legislation is an important step forward in the fight for children’s health worldwide.

Take action now! Email your senators and urge them to co-sponsor the Global Child Survival Act to give children around the world the opportunity to grow up safe and healthy.