Toronto, Ontario
28 April 2014
Canada is committed to helping reduce the number of women and children in developing countries that die from simple, preventable causes which can be addressed with proven, affordable and cost–effective solutions that most Canadians take for granted.
To this end, it is hosting Saving Every Woman Every Child: Within Arm's Reach, an international Summit that will shape the future of Child and Maternal Health collaborations in Canada and around the world.
On April 28, 2014 at the Mount SinaiHospital in Toronto, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced the Summit themes and key participants, unveiled the Summit logo and launched the official website.
The Saving Every Woman Every Child: Within Arm's Reach Summit will bring together Canadian and international leaders, experts, civil society, businesses, academia, developed and developing countries, international organizations and global foundations to ensure that maternal, newborn and child health remains a core part of the global development agenda.
The Summit will be divided into three themes, one for each day: Delivering Results for Mothers and Children, Doing More Together Globally and Real Action for Women's and Children's Health. The agenda will include high–level keynote speeches and a mix of plenary and thematic sessions. They will focus on specific maternal, newborn and child health issues that need further support and must be prioritized in the final push towards preventing maternal and child mortality. These include:
- reducing newborn mortality;
- improving accountability through strengthened civil registration and vital statistics systems;
- saving lives through immunization;
- scaling up nutrition as a foundation for healthy lives; and,
- building new partnerships with the private sector to leverage innovation and financing.
The Summit is a significant opportunity to advance the goals and targets related to maternal, newborn and child health that should be included in the post–2015 global development framework and to ensure that focus and investments are maintained on these critical issues. There will be an emphasis on creating new partnerships with the private sector and embracing new technologies and innovative approaches to achieve these goals.
The official name of the Summit, Saving Every Woman Every Child: Within Arm's Reach recognizes the fact that, with renewed global efforts, ending the preventable deaths of mothers and children is attainable in our lifetime. The name also builds on the United Nations' Every Woman Every Child Initiative, a global movement launched following Canada's Muskoka Initiative in 2010. The shift in messaging and brand identity is an important step to building global momentum, brand equity and concentrated focus on this important issue.
The Summit logo, which was created by the Government of Canada, represents the timeless and universal image of a mother embracing her child.
The official Summit website (www.canada.ca/MNCH) includes videos, photos, field stories and general information on maternal, newborn and child health as well as the Summit program. During the Summit, the website will include live–streaming and on–demand videos of many of the events. The website was developed by the Government of Canada and went public on April 28, 2014.
The themes for the Summit were developed in consultation with key Canadian stakeholders active in global health along with international partners. The Government has been working closely with the Canadian Network for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health, a network of Canadian NGOs, academic institutions and health professional associations working together to improve the lives of women and children in the world's poorest countries (www.can-mnch.ca). The Network has been putting its expertise to work on these issues in more than a thousand regions around the world.
Prime Minister Harper announced details on the Summit at a roundtable with members of the Network. The purpose of the roundtable was to discuss the important role played by Canadians in delivering results for women and children in developing countries. The Prime Minister and roundtable participants also discussed the importance of the upcoming Saving Every Woman, Every Child Summit, as an important and dynamic means towards reaffirming Canada's leadership in reigniting global efforts and building new momentum on improving women's and children's health, and demonstrating that continued commitment to saving the world's most vulnerable remains Canada's top development priority.
