Remarks of Chairman Donald M. Payne
Hearing of the Subcommittee on
Child Survival: The Unfinished Agenda to Reduce Global Child Mortality
2200 Rayburn Thursday, March 13, 2008
10:30 AM
Thank you for joining us for this hearing of the
Subcommittee on
Every day 27,000 children under
the age of 5 die, mostly from preventable diseases and conditions. Factors such
as malnutrition, unsafe drinking water, and inadequate access to vaccines
contribute greatly to global child mortality. We know how to prevent most of
these deaths, but we have not spent the resources necessary to do so. It comes as no surprise that most of these
are children born into the developing world, nor that half of them occur in
In 2000, the
United Nations adopted the 8 Millennium Development Goals (MDG’s) and called on
member states to provide the necessary resources to reach key targets by 2015.
The 4th goal is to reduce child mortality by two-thirds. Given the fact that malnutrition caused by
chronic hunger causes the deaths of more than 5 million children each year, we
cannot reach this goal without making strides in the first Millennium
Development Goal – halving extreme poverty and hunger. This underscores the
need for an integrated approach.
The United Nations
Children’s Fund (UNICEF) recently released The State of the World’s Children
2008: Child Survival, which reports that annual deaths among children under 5
fell to 9.7 million a year, the first time below 10 million since we started
tracking this in 1960.
The fact that 9.7
million children are dying each year of preventable diseases sends a clear
message to us all – we absolutely must do much more. Those figures represent human beings; little
children who deserve a shot at life just as much as children born here in the
This is not to say
that the work of countless individuals, groups, and governments are not making
a difference. On the contrary, their efforts are critical and have made serious
inroads in reducing child mortality. Yet, there are some countries where child
survival is not improving, such as
This means that we
must increase our investments in life-saving programs. If there is any good
news to report on child survival, it is that according to the World Health
Organization (WHO), two-thirds of child deaths are preventable. Moreover, they
can be prevented at with small investments.
We are joined today by Congresswoman Betty McCollum
of
The
significant commitment of the
Two
weeks ago this committee voted for a bill which will provide $50 billion in the
reauthorization of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and
this, once passed in both chambers, will be a great victory for the President
and for the Congress. PEPFAR will be remembered
for years to come as the cornerstone of President Bush’s
At the same time, we must take into account that, according to the US Coalition for Child Survival, more than 90 percent of child deaths are caused by preventable, treatable diseases and conditions other than HIV/AIDS and malaria. So as we ramp up PEPFAR, we must also increase funding for programs to address the basic health needs of children and pregnant mothers – such as immunizations, nutrition assistance, and treatments for diarrhea and other infections.
We can save
children’s lives. We can prevent the nearly 10 million child deaths that will
occur unnecessarily this year. We must begin by providing significantly
increased funding for child survival in FY’09 and then increase our commitment
each year, as called for in the McCollum-Shays bill. I urge members of this committee to cosponsor HR 2266 and look
forward to hearing from our witnesses.