Saturday, October 9, 2010

Starved for Attention


(scroll ke bawah untuk points dalam Bahasa Melayu)


Do you know that almost 195 million children under 5 years of age are affected by malnutrition, with 90 percent living in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia?

Malnutrition contributes significantly to the premature death of children because the immune systems of malnourished children are less resistant to common diseases. Or in other words, malnourished children are more prone to fall sick over treatable diseases such as Pneumonia (radang paru-paru) or a simple chicken pox.

In fact, malnutrition contributes to at least 1/3rd of the 8 million annual deaths of children under five or five.

WHY IS THIS HAPPENING?

When we continuously brag about what we ate (and gonna eat) in our Facebook or Twitter there are people living in other part of the world who find it difficult to feed their children, let alone themselves. However, we are grateful that our government provides appropriate nutritional help for children with needs like these.




For the unfortunate countries, they rely on the help from larger countries, eg. the US. US is the world’s largest food aid donor. It produces and ships hundreds of thousands of tons of fortified cereals made of corn and soy blend (CSB), which may relieve a young child’s hunger but do not provide proper nourishment. CSB does not meet standards for infant cereals intended for healthy children, let alone those who are malnourished and underweight.

So, the US sends food overseas to children that it does not use in its own nutrition programs.

THIS DOUBLE STANDARD NEEDS TO END!


In order to stop these from happening, Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and VII Photo present “Starved for Attention,” a multimedia campaign exposing the neglected and largely invisible crisis of childhood malnutrition.



“Starved for Attention” aims to rewrite the story of malnutrition through a series of multimedia documentaries that seamlessly blend photography and video from some of the most accomplished and award-winning photojournalists working today.

By signing the “Starved for Attention” online petition, you can be part of the campaign to rewrite the story of malnutrition and demand that the 195 million malnourished children get the attention they need and deserve to escape the deadly cycle of malnutrition.






It makes me sad knowing that that there are millions of children out there who suffers from malnutrition, when ironically, obesity is one of the main problem here in our country.

The most that we can do now is to sign the petition to support Doctors Without Borders' efforts to demand that governments supplying humanitarian food aid ensure that the food meets nutritional standards for infants and young children.




I rewrote the story of malnutrition. How about YOU?

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[B.M. translation]
  • 195 juta kanak-kanak di seluruh dunia, terutamanya di negara dunia ke-3, mengalami masalah malnutrisi.
  • Amerika merupakan salah satu negara terbesar yang tampil ke hadapan untuk menolong menghantar bekalan makanan kepada negara yang memerlukan.
  • AKAN TETAPI, Amerika didapati menghantar bekalan makanan berbentuk bijirin soya dan jagung, yang semestinya TIDAK DAPAT MEMBANTU TUMBESARAN KANAK-KANAK.
  • Didapati juga, Amerika TIDAK menggunakan makanan berbentuk bijirin soya dan jagung untuk diberi kepada rakyat mereka yang memerlukan.
  • Perbuatan PILIH KASIH (double standard) ini PERLU DIHENTIKAN!
  • Oleh yang demikian, persatuan DOKTOR TANPA SEMPADAN ingin mengumpul petisyen supaya bantuan bekalan makanan kepada negara dunia ke-3 ini menepati nutrisi tumbesaran kanak-kanak.
  • Sila tekan di sini untuk membantu mereka!
(pelik sungguh buat translation ke BM ni :p)

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