Other issues 0 comments

At Globespotter we have spent a lot of time recently on climate change and global warming, especially in the lead up to the Live Earth concerts. We still feel that global warming and climate change are very important issues, but we also feel that we need to remember some of the other issues that are important to us, and may have recently been overshadowed by the huge focus on global warming. Issues like poverty and other human rights issues come to mind - things like HIV/AIDS and Malaria. There was an article in July's National Geographic Magazine on Malaria that really opened my eyes. We in the western world don't ever think of the impact of malaria, but it kills over a million people worldwide every year - 90% of them in Africa - 70% of them children under the age of five.

If malaria was here in our countries, killing large numbers of children, you can be sure there would be an outcry and we would demand action.

Why is there no outcry for the children dying of malaria and other diseases around the world? Is it that we just don't know what is going on - or do we not care?

I'd like to think it is more that we don't know. That is the main reason I started Globespotter - so that we can learn more about what is going on around the world. Sometimes it will be tough - nobody wants to hear about these kinds of issues, but I think it is important to know - so that we can be upset enough to take action - and that is really the important thing - is to take some kind of action to help.

Let me know what you are doing for poverty and human rights issues in your local area or around the world.