Posts Tagged ‘Comic Relief’

This Sunday is World Malaria Day. A day to celebrate all of the positive action that has been made towards the reduction and eradication of this disease (which still infects around 250m people per year), and a day to concentrate efforts towards further progress to the ambitious global targets. Visit the World Malaria Day website to find out more and show your support this weekend http://www.worldmalariaday.org/home_en.cfm

According to Andrew Jack in today’s FT special report on “Combating Malaria”, this year will mark the most hopeful World Malaria Day to date.

Why?

Well, for one Ray Chambers (the UN special envoy for malaria) is apparently confident that efforts are on track towards an ambitious mosquito net distribution programme which will complete during 2010.  He quotes “today we know we can achieve the goal of universal coverage of nets by the end of this year and near zero deaths from the disease by 2015.”

Evidence also supports the fact that far more effective tools for prevention and treatment have become available and distribution methods have been improved. In addition, the pipeline of technologies is growing with more effective medicines, improved diagnostic tests and possible vaccines emerging.

However, on top of this it is undoubtedly sophisticated and wide-spread advocacy and communications programmes which have really helped shape this positive environment. Comic Relief for example put a huge emphasis on malaria, dedicating the money raised by the 2009 celebrity Kilimanjaro climbers to the disease and investing in on the ground expertise (through Malaria Consortium and the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria). In addition, this year we have the mighty football world cup in South Africa supporting the cause which will provide a truly global platform.

While there is certainly still far to go, it is exciting that World Malaria Day will this year be celebrated by the malaria community with such positivity and confidence. Visit the World Malaria Day website to find out more and show your support this weekend http://www.worldmalariaday.org/home_en.cfm

Friday sees the twelfth Red Nose Day celebrated in Britain for Comic Relief.

Last year’s Red Nose Day smashed all records, raising a massive £40.2m. I will be intrigued to see whether this year’s event will come anywhere close to meeting that total, given that it will be the first large scale live telethon fundraising event in the UK since the recession hit.

We’ve already seen a vast amount of publicity in the run up to the event, mobilising the population to take part. The messages of Comic Relief have always juxtaposed the light-hearted with the serious, but this year - in my mind - the tone and messaging seem very different to previous years. I’ve noticed that the strategy is always to reserve the hardcore appeal films until the night, but this year there is little mention of money, charity and especially Africa. Take for example, the coverage achieved surrounding the expedition that nine celebrities embarked upon up Mount Kilimanjaro. When I searched for coverage around the expedition 99% of my results were surrounding the gruelling climb, Fearne Cotton missing her lip gloss and Ashley Cole misbehaving back home. There is less mention of malaria and Tanzania.

Undoubtedly the recession will have fed into communications strategies and will have been thought of as a major challenge for organisers for many months. It is a tough ask to promote large scale giving, especially for overseas projects when we are faced daily with headlines of more redundancies, rising UK poverty rates and economic turmoil. Could this be why the focus of this year’s event seems to have resulted as more inward looking than previous years?

With this in mind, I’ll be interested to see how things play out on the night. Will appeal films have a new focus to better suit the attitudes of our recession hit society? Will the recession be mentioned? And will the focus fall more on the UK than Africa? I think that Comic Relief 2009 will be the ultimate litmus test gauging British society’s attitudes towards the developing world in times of recession. I will be very intrigued to see whether the nation’s generosity will stand up in adverse times. Let’s see whether we’ll come anywhere near to meeting that pre-recession £40.2m.