[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 135 (Friday, December 8, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Page S11686]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
FIGHTING MALARIA
Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, earlier this year, the widely read, widely
respected Sports Illustrated columnist Rick Reilly launched his Nothing
But Nets campaign after learning that thousands of Africans--including
about 3000 children--die each day from malaria and that simple mosquito
netting could save many of these lives.
When I saw recently that his readers had kicked in more than $1.2
million for this effort--enough to buy 150,000 nets--I had to give that
dollar total a double-take before it sunk in. His campaign has
collected enough to buy thousands and thousands of nets, enough to save
thousands and thousands of lives. Those nets, distributed by the United
Nations Foundation and the World Health Organization, already are
accomplishing that.
What Rick Reilly's crusade shows is that if you give Americans a
clear and worthy goal, just about anything is possible.
Government and private relief agencies should be taking notes--and a
lesson--from Rick Reilly. There are so many other devastating diseases
that we could control or even conquer, if we summon the will.
I ask unanimous consent that Rick Reilly's column about this project
be printed in the Record. There being no objection, the material was
ordered to be printed in the Record.
[Sports Illustrated, Nov. 28, 2006]
Nothing But Thanks
(By Rick Reilly)
Seven months ago you and I found out that each day 3,000
African children die of malaria for the very sad reason that
they can't afford mosquito nets over their beds. Didn't seem
right to us. Sports is nothing but nets--lacrosse nets,
cutting down the nets, New Jersey Nets. So SI started the
Nothing But Nets campaign. Doctors guaranteed that if you
sent in $20, you'd save at least one kid's life, probably
two.
It was the alltime no-brainer. Skip lunch; save a life. Buy
the Top-Flites instead of the Titleists; save a life. Don't
bet on the Redskins; save a life. Nothing to research. No
government to topple. No warlords to fight.
Bless your little hearts, all 17,000-plus of you who
chipped in more than $1.2 million--enough to buy 150,000
nets, which the United Nations Foundation and the World
Health Organization started hanging all over Nigeria, where
kids younger than five are getting murdered by mosquitoes
that come out only at night.
I know, because I saw the nets. Just got back. Feel a
little bad about going without you. After all, it was your
money. So let's pretend it was you who made the trip, not me.
Remember? Everywhere you went, people mistook you for King
Tut. Women got down on their knees and kissed your hand.
Whole towns threw festivals. The king in every ward summoned
you to his one-room, one-lightbulb palace. One pointed his
horsehair scepter at you and pronounced, ``Thank you for dee
nets. All my wives use dem!'' Turns out he has four wives and
23 kids, and they're all under the nets, which is a good
thing because the open sewer that runs right outside his
shack is a kind of one-stop malaria center.
Everywhere you went, 40 people followed: doctors and nurses
and random government suits and guards with AK-47s and vice-
kings. You rode in an eight-truck caravan past unimaginable
squalor, vans on fire and guys selling caskets on the
street--a very good business in Nigeria, where the average
life span is 47. And every time you opened your car door, two
drummers beat a skull-busting welcome. You'd pull into a
school, and the principal would hang a ribbon around your
neck and say something you couldn't hear. ``What?'' you'd
holler over the drums.
"We humbly fumalk apoplia!''
And you'd shrug, and he'd gesture to the 200 kids behind
him, who were chanting something over and over, their faces
beaming. Later you'd find out it was, ``Thank you, white
person!''
And they'd play a soccer game in your honor that featured
nine-year-olds who played like 14-year-olds in the U.S., on
fields full of weeds and trash, with goals made of tree
branches. In three games the closest thing you saw to a boy
with shoes was a set of brothers who wore one sock each.
And they'd hand you the mike, and you'd try to say how
blown away you were and how you wished you could raise 100
times more in donations, because already one hospital in
Nigeria is saying that since the nets went up, outpatient
cases of malaria have dropped from 80 a month to 50. But
they'd all put their hands to their ears and go, ``What?''
When you bribed the drummers into taking a union break, you
finally met the people you'll never forget: the mothers.
Turns out they're nothing but nuts about the nets. In fact,
so many mothers want the nets that to get one, the World
Health Organization requires them to bring their kids in for
a measles vaccination. How often do you get two for one on
diseases?
You met a mother who walked half a day to get a net. You
met a woman who sleeps with her four kids under her net,
maybe because she knows that three out of every 10 child
deaths in Nigeria are from malaria.
In the fetid slums of Lagos you met a woman named Shifawu
Abbas who's had malaria twice. ``Everybody wants the nets
here, everybody!'' she said, beaming. ``My sister visited
from the country and tried to steal it from me!''
Still, as you were climbing back into your air-conditioned
SUV, she yanked back your hand and begged, ``Please? Can I
come with you?''
Sorry, you said.
On the last day you met Noimot Bakare, a mother whose
youngest child died of malaria. She was so grateful that she
trembled as she spoke. ``Malaria is killing our children,''
she said, holding her toddler. ``There is so much need here.
God will bless you for the work you are doing.''
Please go to NothingButNets.net and keep it up.
For that, we humbly fumalk apoplia.
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