How the World Treats Its Children<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

A civilization should be judged by the way it treats its most vulnerable members. Will the world care for its children? In May 2002, world leaders gathered for a Special Session of the UN General Assembly on Children – a follow-up to the 1990 World Summit for Children, and an opportunity to review progress. On 20 November, 2002, the UN observed Universal Children’s Day. Margaretha Jones, Co-Leader of the IHEU UN (NY) delegation, has participated in the Special Session on Children and the Working Group on the Rights of the Child at UNICEF.

 

So how are our children doing? Not as well as they should. Globally, 1 in 4 of the world’s 2 billion children live in abject poverty in families with incomes lower than $1 a day. Today, 1 in 12 children die before the age of five, mostly from preventable diseases such as malaria, measles and diarrhoea. Disease leads to poverty, and poverty deepens disease. It has been demonstrated that where health takes hold, women, knowing their children will survive, choose to have fewer children. Literacy, equality, the environment, and economic opportunity all improve. Health and the status of women are key ingredients for improving the condition of all people in the world.

 

Globally, the condition of children is morally unacceptable. However, all is not darkness. Some significant progress has been made in recent decades. Two minimum needs – safe drinking water and improved sanitation – are now available to nearly 1 billion more people. Some 2.5 billion children have been saved yearly by successful immunization programmes.

 

Polio has been almost totally eliminated. Many more children are attending school.

 

Granted that there have been real improvements, serious obstacles nevertheless remain. They include wars, AIDS, corruption and lack of democracy. For many years now, in spite of foreign aid, far more resources and money have been flowing out of developing countries into the economies of affluent countries. The amount has been estimated at $186 billion in 2000 – a staggering sum, particularly when contrasted with the comparatively small amount of $7 billion in addition to present funding needed to raise basic standards worldwide.

 

In spite of these difficulties, poor countries can make progress, given political will, good governance, and a deliberate decision to invest in their children. Malawi and Bangladesh, for example, have made great efforts to improve girls’ education. A poor country can also provide reasonable overall living conditions for its people in terms of healthcare, education and life expectancy, as shown by Costa Rica and the Indian state of Kerala.

 

Admirable efforts have been made by NGOs and UN agencies with limited budgets. Progress could be cheap. The task is to make it happen. More can be done. After all, our children are the world’s future.

 

Sylvain and Phyllis Ehrenfeld are, respectively, IHEU’s and AEU’s National Service Conference NGO representatives to the UN at New York.