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The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Donates $3 Million to Fight Measles
Written by
Mason Booth
, Staff Writer, RedCross.org
Monday, September 29, 2003 — “Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel” – the common hymn in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints beckons people to not stand idly by and watch as conditions deteriorate, but to get involved and work to make the world a better place. The challenge is one the Church itself is living up to, exemplified most recently by its $3 million donation to the Measles Initiative.
Harold Brown, Managing Director of Welfare and Humanitarian Services for the Church, presents Marsha J. Evans, President and CEO of the American Red Cross, with the first of three $1 million donations.
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Every year, nearly 800,000 children die from measles around the world, nearly half of whom live in Africa. Tragically, although a measles vaccine costs less than $1 per child the disease remains the world’s leading vaccine-preventable childhood killer.
In an effort to eliminate measles in Africa, the American Red Cross teamed up with the United Nations Foundation, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United Nations Children’s Fund, World Health Organization and International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and launched the Measles Initiative, a bold, five-year commitment to vaccinate 200 million children and prevent 1.2 million deaths from measles in Africa.
The Red Cross first approached the Church to support the vaccination effort nearly one year ago. A long-time supporter of the Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund, the church immediately began examining ways to help.
”We were analyzing our major initiatives and felt the Measles Initiative was a good fit and a way for us to make a real difference,” said Harold Brown, Managing Director of Welfare and Humanitarian Services for the Church.
Brown witnessed that difference firsthand while observing a mass measles vaccination campaign in Zambia in June.
”There is really no way to convey what it is like to see the Measles Initiative at work,” he said. “It’s a logistics miracle, the way they can vaccinate millions of children in only a few days.”
Convinced of the campaigns effectiveness, the church pledged $3 million to the Measles Initiatives over the next three years. The first installment of $1 million was presented to Marsha J. Evans, American Red Cross President and CEO, at the Wednesday (Sept. 17), premiere of the Measles Initiative documentary “Disease of the Wind” at the Motion Picture Association of America in Washington, D.C.
“The church has once again illustrated its significant commitment to ending suffering on a worldwide basis. We cannot express our enormous gratitude,” Evans said.
For Brown, though, the church’s commitment was easily summarized.
“To be able to prevent a child from dying – to be able to help so many, so easily – now what could be better than that.”
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