UN / MATERNAL HEALTH FORUM WRAP (02:47)

23 September 2009

UN / MATERNAL HEALTH FORUM WRAP (02:47)

UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown hosts a global forum on maternal mortality, "Investing In Our Common Future: Healthy Women, Healthy Children." France's first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy hosts "Protecting Mothers and Children against HIV." UNTV

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Full Script

STORY: UN / MATERNAL HEALTH FORUM WRAP
TRT: 2.47
SOURCE: UNTV 
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / FRENCH / NATS

DATELINE: 23 SEPTEMBER 2009, NEW YORK CITY / FILE

SHOTLIST:

FILE – RECENT, NEW YORK CITY

1. Wide shot, exterior, United Nations Headquarters

23 SEPTEMBER 2009, NEW YORK CITY

2. Wide shot, “Investing In Our Common Future: Healthy Women, Healthy Children” event
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Ban Ki-moon, United Nations Secretary-General:
“We still have a long way to go to reach the goal of reducing child mortality rates by two thirds by the year 2015. And we have a long road to travel to reduce maternal mortality. This is the slowest moving target of the MDGs. Yet the truth is that we can achieve our Goals. We know what to do. We know what it takes to save lives. We know how to improve the health of women, babies and children.”
4. Med shot, audience
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Gordon Brown, Prime Minister, United Kingdom:
“User fees in twenty African countries have by themselves been responsible for nearly a quarter million child deaths every year. So in total, millions of children could have died as a result of our failure to abolish user fees. The evidence is stark. The reality is shameful. The death toll can be counted. The pain is incalculable. So today we must join together to end that pain.”

EXCERPT FROM DOCUMENTARY "NO WOMAN NO CRY" - TANZANIA, DATE UNKNOWN 
 
6. SOUND OVER PICTURE (English): "For more than half a million women a year, pregnancy is a death sentence."
7. UPSOUND (Swahili) 
Health worker: "We do not have all the necessary equipment to take care of you in case of an emergency. There can be complications with the baby. You can have excessive bleeding or any other unexpected changes with the pregnancy. Do you have any money to get to the hospital?" 
Pregnant woman: "No." 
Health worker: "At all?" 
Pregnant woman: "No."
9. Wide shot, pregnant woman sitting on bed

23 SEPTEMBER 2009, NEW YORK CITY

10. Wide shot, American model Christy Turlington standing to applause 
11. Med shot, Christy Turlington sitting next to French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Gordon Brown, Prime Minister, United Kingdom:
“With the announcements that six countries are making today, over ten million more people will have access to free health services. Burundi is announcing a program today to provide free healthcare for all children and pregnant women in the country. Nepal, Malawi, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Ghana - all of them will today make historic progress with their announcements too.”
13. Wide shot, “Protecting Mothers and Children against HIV” event
14. SOUNDBITE (French) Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, First Lady of France:
“In large parts of the world the face of AIDS is that of a mother, a mother who is afraid for herself and afraid for her child, a mother who is afraid of being rejected by her relatives and family and country, a mother afraid of not receiving care and affecting her child.”
15. Wide shot, French President Nicolas Sarkozy applauding

STORYLINE:

UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced today (23 September) that his task force on maternal and children’s health has mobilized 5.3 billion dollars to invest in health care. 
 
At an event on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon introduced Brown and other members of the task force, which includes Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg of Norway, World Health Organization Chief Margaret Chan, World Bank President Robert Zoellick, and ministers from over 50 countries.
 
Speaking about the need to scale up interventions in to save the lives of children and mothers, Ban said there was much more to be done. The goal to reduce maternal mortality by three quarters by 2015 remained the slowest moving target of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
 
According to the findings of the task force, meeting the health related MDGs will cost 36 to 45 billion dollars in global investments.
 
Ban urged nations to work together to address the “tragedy” of unnecessary maternal deaths, saying that societies can be judged by the health of its mothers.
 
Prime Minister Brown noted that 500,000 mothers die in childbirth every year and 12,000 children die daily in Africa. Many of these deaths, he said, were preventable. He said that particular blame must be placed on misguided development advice in the 1980s that encouraged countries to charge user fees for medical service. Those policies resulted in millions of child deaths in Africa, he said.

The event included the screening of parts of a documentary currently being produced by American model Christy Turlington on the challenges faced by pregnant women around the world. The film also showcases some success stories of countries that have made progress in tackling maternal mortality, such as Tanzania.
 
Prime Minister Brown announced that as of today, six countries: Burundi, Nepal, Malawi, Uganda, Sierra Leone and Liberia were abolishing user fees for healthcare for children and pregnant women. He also unveiled a new UK-based center for progressive health finance to advise countries that are striving to abolish fees.
 
At a separate side event to the UN General Assembly, the First Lady of France, Carla Bruni Sarkozy presided over a panel on HIV/AIDS and the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of the virus. She applauded the efforts of the Global Fund To Fund AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, UNAIDS and UNICEF in particular for their work on HIV and noted that four million people in developing countries are now receiving treatment, compared to virtually none five years ago.
 
Bruni-Sarkozy said that in many parts of the world, the face of AIDS is the face of a mother. She encouraged world leaders to make it a goal to double the number of pregnant mothers receiving HIV treatment in the next 18 months.

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