World Disasters Report to be launched by Red Cross on 28th October 2004
The World Disasters Report compiled and distributed annually by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies will be launched at a media conference in Johannesburg on Thursday 28th October 2004.
This year the theme focuses on community resilience throughout the world. It not only includes the physical, social and economic adversities of ‘natural’ disasters but takes an in depth look into catastrophic diseases such as HIV and AIDS, drought, malnutrition, poor healthcare, poverty and even the hidden disasters caused by heatwaves and coldwaves in Europe.
National President of the South African Red Cross Society (SARCS), Mandisa Kalako-Williams, stated “As natural and man made disasters continue to batter our communities with devastating results, the only solution is to rely on and learn from the affected communities themselves. We can no longer afford to impose solutions onto them, as they have both the experience and the coping mechanisms that have carried them through all the difficult times. They know when the worst droughts have attacked their villages. They can direct us towards the best ways of preventing and sometimes pre-empting some of these calamities.”
The components of the International Federation’s Global HIV and AIDS program include three areas of intervention as indicated in the Federation publication “Reducing household vulnerability to HIV&AIDS and Tuberculosis”: Stigma and Discrimination; Prevention; Care and Treatment.
SARCS is part of the Federation’s Southern Africa network for addressing the challenges of those infected and affected by HIV&AIDS. Their HIV&AIDS related programming follows the same areas of intervention. As the impact of the pandemic is changing the social structures of communities, SARCS is looking at long-term interventions that will build resilience and capacity. As a priority target group, orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) within the South African communities will receive such assistance from SARCS.
Other highlighted issues in the 2004 Report include the latest international trends, facts and analysis of contemporary crises, whether ‘natural” or human made, quick-onset or chronic. from SARCS.