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FIA regularly focuses a spotlight on current global health and development issues, and what our faith communities are doing to help solve them. Below are FIA's Featured Issues and click here for related faith-based resources:
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HANDWASHING SAVES LIVES
This year, Global Handwashing Day, October 15, focuses on food hygiene because up to 70% of cases of diarrhea may be associated with poor food hygiene. Beyond washing our hands, keeping utensils and dishes clean, properly storing and reheating food, boiling water and milk where needed, and thoroughly cooking food make us all safer. Learn more... |
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LITERACY: More Than Book Smart
Here’s an eye-catching reality: No country has reached sustained economic growth without achieving near universal primary education. Supporting international basic education is more than book smart; it’s a critical investment in U.S. and global security. It decreases extremism, strengthens democratic institutions, reduces global poverty and increases sustained economic growth. And it demonstrates American values. When Congress passed the READ Act with strong bipartisan support one year ago, they accelerated basic education programs around the world with greater transparency, to break through key barriers that keep millions of children from basic education. Learn more... |
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SURPRISING FINDINGS IN PUBLIC OPINION OF U.S. FOREIGN ASSISTANCE
We’re all trying to find that magic pill: How to effectively communicate about the historic success of U.S. foreign assistance. Here are a number of projects that offer some helpful and sometimes counterintuitive and surprising findings: Learn more... |
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BREASTFEEDING AND CHILD SURVIVAL
78 million babies – or three in five – are not breastfed within the first hour of life, putting them at higher risk of death and disease, and making them less likely to continue breastfeeding, according to a joint report prepared by UNICEF, WHO, and Capture the Moment. Most of these babies are born in low- and middle-income countries. Breastfed children have at least six times greater chance of survival in the early months than non-breastfed children. The potential impact of optimal breastfeeding practices is especially important in developing countries that have a high burden of disease and low access to clean water and sanitation. But non-breastfed children in industrialized countries are also at greater risk of dying. Learn more... |
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HUMAN TRAFFICKING
Every July 30th marks World Day Against Trafficking in Persons Hebrews 11: By faith Abraham…set out for a place…not knowing where he was going. At any given time, 20-27 million people, not knowing where they are going, end up trafficked into abusive labor situations, indentured servitude and sex slavery. Trafficking is modern-day slavery; the second largest and fastest growing illegal trade in the world, valued at around $32 billion. The U.S. isn’t exempt from human trafficking within our borders, one of the factors that increasingly drives U.S. faith-based groups to this issue, bringing it and its victims into their congregations. Evangelical Christians were key passing the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, which prevents the quick deportation of many migrant children. Learn more... |
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INVESTING IN ALL GOD'S CHILDREN 16 Generals Submitted Testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee calling for the protection of foreign assistance funding. This unprecedented support initiated in 2017 was shared with the SFRC, Senate SFOPS, House SFOPS, HFAC and HASC committees. Learn more... |
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U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY DEPENDS ON "SOFT POWER"
The U.S. spends 60% less on foreign assistance as a percentage of our GDP today, than under President Reagan – currently less than 1% of the federal budget. Since President Trump’s proposed budget and personnel cuts are a radical departure for U.S. foreign assistance, it begs a very real question... What would a world without “soft power” look like? Learn more... |
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GIRLS' EDUCATION: A STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENT PRIORITY
The number of children and adolescents not enrolled in school is on the rise. We know the problem is especially acute for girls. According to UNESCO estimates, 130 million girls between ages 6 to 17 are out of school and 15 million girls of primary-school age—half of them in sub-Saharan Africa— will never enter a classroom. Yet we also know that better educated women tend to be healthier, participate more in the formal labor market, earn higher incomes, have fewer children, marry at a later age and enable better health care and education for their children. These factors combined can help lift households, communities and nations out of poverty. Learn more... |
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CLEAN WATER: CRITICAL TO HEALTHCARE
As medicine travels across bionics and gene therapy into string theory and nanotechnology, one the most important discoveries that can still save millions of lives is being left behind:
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U.S. FOREIGN ASSISTANCE DELIVERS HOPE AND HUMAN SECURITY -- SUCCESS IS HISTORIC
In everything, do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets. U.S. foreign assistance is some of the most compassionate work we do. It may also be some of the most misunderstood. Faith communities and faith-based organizations work hand-in-hand with critical U.S. government leadership, funds and influence, helping make foreign assistance a life-saving, unprecedented success. Consider: Now every year, millions of children thrive beyond their 5th birthdays when just 25 years ago, they would have died. In 2015 alone, 6.8 million more children under age 5 survived than would have in 1990. learn more... |
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LIVING WATER/DEADLY HEALTHCARE
Guess how many times the Bible names water. 25 times? 50? Try 722 times. Perhaps that helps explain why water is the single symbol shared by every world religion. Used throughout rituals to cleanse, purify and sanctify, water is the foundation for all life. But that turns out not to be true, in of all places, hospitals and healthcare facilities around the world. During the middle Ages, Europeans -- and much of the world -- lived in filth with poor hygiene and practically no sanitation. Life-expectancy measured in the teens. It not only endangered mothers and newborns, epidemics and diseases like bubonic plague, typhus, smallpox and tuberculosis (“consumption”) thrived in this dirty environment, taking a massive toll on humanity. Today we call it WASH: Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene. It’s vital to healthcare and it’s shockingly absent. learn more... |
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REFUGEES
The stranger is no stranger in Scripture: At least 36 times, the Hebrew Bible commands justice and love of the stranger. He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing. [Deuteronomy 10:18] Perhaps this command to love the stranger is repeated more than any other because loving the stranger is necessary, but sometimes really hard, when we have our own needs and concerns to worry about, too. The New Testament and Qu'ran are clear, too: Perhaps it is no coincidence that this passage is one of the most famous in the New Testament: I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me. [Matthew 25] The Qu'ran says it is an act of righteousness to give money to “Ibn Al-Sabil”, a wayfarer. Worship Allah and associate nothing with Him, and to parents do good, and to relatives, orphans, the needy, the near neighbor, the neighbor farther away, the companion at your side, the traveler… [An-Nisaa’ 4:36] learn more... |
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FOOD SECURITY, AND NUTRITION
Food Security and Nutrition are among the most important issues we face now and into the future. Globally, 795 million people remain hungry today. Between now and 2050, the global population is projected to rise from 7 to 9.2 billion people, demanding a 60% increase in global food production. DID YOU KNOW?
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SAVING MOTHERS WORLDWIDE
From Mother's Day in the U.S. and International Day of the Family, to the Congressional Child Survival Prayer Breakfast and the first ever World Humanitarian Summit, May is about Moms. Faith-based organizations have long battled the dangers of giving birth. In Ghana, for example, women have little control over their pregnancies and child-rearing. So Catholic Relief Services (CRS) took on the sensitive challenge of overcoming harmful cultural practices that contribute to maternal and child deaths. During a 4-year, USAID-funded effort, CRS looked to the community for help, training volunteers who could persuade husbands and mothers-in-law to include expectant mothers in decisions about healthier birthing practices. CRS also engaged local leaders--village chiefs, religious leaders, elders and queen mothers--who can help change dangerous cultural practices. The results are impressive! learn more... |