New Zealanders challenged to do one thing

HRH the Princess Royal, Princess Anne has launched a new Save the Children campaign and website that challenges New Zealanders to do one thing to help save a child’s life.

Long time Save the Children supporter Princess Anne said that every year, nine million children around the world are at risk of dying from preventable causes before they reach the age of five.

She went on to say that millions of lives could be saved through simple low cost solutions like monitoring mothers through pregnancy, providing cheap antibiotics to prevent pneumonia and insecticide-treated bed nets to prevent malaria.

Save the Children’s EVERY ONE campaign shows New Zealanders that by doing one small thing - such as donating the cost of a cup of coffee - everyone really can help save a life.

In a global survey the majority of people said that they'd give up a meal to save a child's life. In New Zealand 23% said they'd give up a day's pay and 20% said they'd give up a holiday.

On the campaign website www.do1thing.org.nz New Zealanders can talk about what they are willing to do – and see what others are doing.

Dr Allan Freeth, Chairman of Save the Children New Zealand joined Princess Anne by challenging people to come up with their own way of raising money to help save these young lives saying:

“We believe that EVERY ONE can make a difference – simply by doing just one thing. A collective effort can generate amazing results and the sum is always greater than the parts.

I love watching movies, my plan is to donate the weekly cost of renting one of these movies to the EVERY ONE campaign.”

In addition, TelstraClear pledged ongoing support for Save the Children as part of the organisation's corporate social responsibility programme.

"TelstraClear will working alongside Save the Children as an innovation partner, which will see us supporting and increasing their technological capacity and capability,” said Dr Freeth.

Internationally, Save the Children is aiming to raise $2 billion by 2015 for health and nutrition work through the EVERY ONE campaign – which is less than half the amount spent globally on bottled water each year.