The new vaccine against malaria, women who save jungles and other hopeful news to start 2024

More than 21,000 Palestinians have died in Gaza since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7 and the Israeli Government of Benjamin Netanyahu responded with a daily bombing campaign against the Strip. The war in Ukraine is entrenched and is advancing inexorably towards its second anniversary. In Sudan, nearly seven million people have been forced to leave their homes after war broke out on April 15 between the regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. In Afghanistan, the earthquake in Herat in October and the arrival of Afghan refugees from Pakistan further aggravated the situation in a country where some 15 million people are already hungry (out of a population of about 40 million). And there are many more examples of how disastrous 2023 has been: the drought and famine in Somalia, the coups d'état in Niger and Gabon, the floods in Mozambique… In fact, global leaders, meeting at the General Assembly of The UN last September confirmed that in the world there is more hunger, more poverty and that it is hotter as a result of climate change.

However, in the middle of this fateful year, there are stories that illuminate and inspire. This is Planeta Futuro's selection of positive news for 2023 to start 2024 with a hopeful approach:

1. New malaria vaccine

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommended a malaria vaccine in October that opens the door for all African children who need it to receive immunization. At least 25 million children are born each year in countries on the continent endemic to this mosquito-transmitted disease, and half a million die annually as a result of it. Since October 2021, there is a four-dose vaccine that can reduce symptomatic disease by 75%, but its production process currently limits the annual injections manufactured to about 18 million, which only allows the complete schedule of 4, 5 million minors. However, the new immunization that the WHO has just recommended, R21/Matrix-M, is similarly effective, but cheaper and opens the door to a more optimistic future: it will be produced by the Serum Institute of India, the largest manufacturer. of vaccines in the world, which has the capacity to create 100 million doses annually, which will make it possible to end the bottleneck that prevented immunization against malaria from reaching all children in places where they can get sick and die as a result of this sickness.

2. Women who break with the canons that subject them

A raped migrant woman who was not believed, but who did not stop protesting until she was heard. A young woman who runs a school for girls clandestinely under the Taliban yoke. An African activist determined to speak loud and clear about sex and, above all, enjoyment. A girl who ran away from her stepfather in Bombay so as not to end up forcibly married and not be forced to stop studying. A Chilean salesperson whose boss recommended she wear tight clothing and declared war on aesthetic violence. These are the stories of five women who rebelled against established social, religious, cultural or political canons. They are voices from distant countries, but their struggle is much more universal than it seems.

3. Seven innovations to save the lives of babies and pregnant women

Rapid diagnosis of postpartum hemorrhage, an injection of intravenous iron against anemia and a probiotic supplement for babies are three of the seven medical innovations or treatments, most of them easy to apply and low cost, that could significantly reduce death of pregnant women and babies, especially in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. This was the conclusion of the annual report Goalkeepers 2023, published by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation last September. “By making new innovations accessible to those who need them most, two million additional lives could be saved by 2030 and 6.4 million lives by 2040,” they estimated.

4. The victory of the siekopai

A historic ruling in Ecuador last November returned to the Siekopai ownership of their ancestral land, Pë'këya, on the border with Peru, where this Amazonian people lived for centuries until they were expelled in 1941 due to the war between the two countries. The judicial decision, which recognizes for the first time the indigenous inhabitants' right to “possession of a territory declared a protected area,” can serve as a precedent for other indigenous communities that are trying to regain control of their land.

5. The decolonization of African cinema

African filmmakers are fighting a battle for the continent's graphic memory, both for recontextualizing the graphic legacy of colonial powers and for access to post-independence films that ended up outside Africa. Alain Kassanda is one of those directors. He set out to tell the story of his grandparents under the colonizing yoke in the Belgian Congo and wanted to compile films from the time. The images he found spoke of how the Belgians civilized the local population, built roads and schools, and of black folklore. “The Congolese always appeared like ghosts. It was racist propaganda in which the Congolese perspective was never shown,” says Kassanda. To make matters worse, he had to pay 25,000 euros to access those graphic files distributed by several Belgian institutions. “They recorded us with
out our consent and now we have to pay for what they stole from us. Restitution involves first of all having access to those files,” he defends.

6. Women who save jungles

Cameroonian activist Cécile Bibiane Ndjebet has dedicated her life to defending the environment and women's rights to land. For this reason, she co-founded two organizations: Cameroon Ecology (2001), with the aim of training women to recover more than 1,000 hectares of forest by 2030; and the African Women's Network for Community Forest Management in 2009. Her work has put her life at risk and at the same time has brought her international recognition. Planeta Futuro interviewed her in 2023, precisely for the last of her awards, the Gulbenkian for Humanity.

7. A ring that protects women from AIDS

The recent global HIV report estimates that there were 1.3 million new infections in 2022 and that South Africa continues to lead the list of new infections. But now the country has a new weapon: it has just received 16,000 dapivirine vaginal rings, the world's first topical HIV prevention method, recommended in January 2021 by the World Health Organization as an additional method for women at risk. considerable infection. Although it is still a pilot program, the reach of this prevention method may grow even further, as the non-profit organization Population Council has just announced that a factory in South Africa will begin producing rings, cheaper and more affordable. more people.

8. The fight against tuberculosis

Until the outbreak of Covid-19, tuberculosis was the deadliest infectious disease in the world. But the war to eradicate it is winning battles. One of them is fought by the South African Phumeza Tisile and the Indian Nandita Venkatesan, who have entered the TIME100 Next 2023 list of “emerging leaders from around the world who are forging the future and defining the next generation of leadership.” The two lost their hearing due to the harsh treatment that was administered a decade ago against tuberculosis resistant to first-line antibiotics. And together, with the support of Doctors Without Borders, they have twisted the arm of the pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson, challenging the extension of its patent on bedaquiline—one of the drugs in the currently recommended regimen for multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, less toxic than the previous one— so that India's generic industry can produce and sell it at a more affordable price. Here you can read the interview with Phumeza Tisile:

Another battle is being fought in Mozambique, which has shown that the disease can be fought with artificial intelligence and a community approach in overcrowded prisons and mines, where infections are skyrocketing:

9. Millet, a weapon against hunger

The world has a weapon to combat hunger and counteract the ravages of commercial dependence, exacerbated by the pandemic and the war in Ukraine: it is millet, an ancient cereal that grows in contexts in which other cereals do not survive, with hardly any water, in degraded soils, with temperatures up to 60 °C and with few fertilizers. Contains fiber, vitamins and antioxidants. It is hypoglycemic and suitable for celiacs. Why don't we use this superfood then? Because it has been forgotten. But the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) wants to transform this reality and the UN General Assembly declared 2023 the International Year of Millet. The UN's objective with this initiative is ambitious: to boost the consumption of this cereal not only in homes in New Delhi and Dakar, but also in those in Madrid and New York, and to do so it is necessary to increase production and highlight the virtues of these grains to farmers, consumers and, above all, governments, so th
at they implement policies that encourage crops.

10. The woman who moved a school from Afghanistan to Rwanda

The Afghan Shabana Basij Rasikh dressed as a child in the nineties so she could walk down the street with her sister and attend a secret school. Knowing the power of education for girls, she founded the School of Leadership in Afghanistan to train young people. He founded it in Kabul, but managed to move it to Rwanda in August 2021, when the Taliban regained power in Afghanistan, and helped “the entire community” of his school, 256 people, including workers, students and teachers, escape to the African country. your families. He now continues to bring dozens of Afghan girls to her center in Rwanda and prepares an online program to educate those who cannot attend.

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