The EVERY ONE Campaign Tour exhibition showcases the artistic journey which is creating widespread awareness about maternal and child mortality in Ethiopia. I visited it yesterday, with my colleague Betty.
The EVERY ONE campaign, initiated by Save the Children UK, aims to help Ethiopia achieve the global Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) 4 and 5 (reducing child mortality and improving maternal health). EVERY ONE and Music May Day Ethiopia (a youth talent group which trains young people between the age of 15-25 in music, theatre, painting and dance) work with Save the Children and the Federal Ministry of Health to raise awareness about these vitally important issues.
At present the infant mortality rate here is 59 deaths every 1000 live births (though the trend is improving) while maternal mortality remains stuck at 676 deaths per 100,000 births – over 80% of mothers in Ethiopia give birth without advice from health professionals or going to health centres.
73 young men and women are participating in the EVERY ONE – Music May Day Ethiopia project and have travelled to remote areas in two major regions of Ethiopia (SNNPR and Amhara) and Addis Ababa to spread the campaign’s messages through community theatre, music and dance.
At the exhibition, I enjoyed a thought-provoking short play and dance performed by several talented members of the project – as part of this they sang the official EVERY ONE Campaign song: “Lemin Timut Enat?” (meaning “Why should a mother die?”). These innovative awareness raising events by the Music May Day team have contributed greatly to challenging traditional views on birth attendants and institutional delivery.
Apparently many of those who saw the powerful performance by Music May Day burst into tears – this was movingly captured in a series of pictures by young painters also involved in the project, which were on display at the exhibition. I believe the Campaign has already made a tremendous contribution to awareness raising.
More generally, Ethiopia is well on track to meet several of the MDGs, but needs to step up the pace. The British government is supporting these efforts through the work of our Department for International Development.
I am optimistic that Ethiopia will have made impressive progress by the target date of 2015, through the combined efforts of the government, donors and civil society.