UNICEF Representative on World Health Summit Regional Meeting in India

NEW DELHI: UNICEF Representative to India, Cynthia McCaffrey, said that UNICEF is excited to be a policy partner for the World Health Summit Regional Meeting 2025 being held in the national capital and called it an “opportunity to talk to a wide audience.

Speaking to ANI on Saturday, McCaffrey stated that the participants during the Summit are discussing the health and needs of a child. She said, “UNICEF is very excited to be a policy partner for the World Health Summit Regional Meeting 2025, which means we have an opportunity to talk to a wide audience. We have policymakers, researchers.

We have communities themselves, and so that is an opportunity to talk about the whole child. The child’s entire health and all the needs of that child and so that’s what we’re doing here is bringing the needs of the whole child and talking to the people who make decisions about that from the policymaker down to the community directly itself.

The World Health Summit Regional Meeting 2025 is taking place in New Delhi from April 25-27. It convenes experts and leaders to work together towards building a healthier future for the region by addressing its most pressing challenges and promoting global health progress, focusing on the overall theme ‘Scaling Access to Ensure Health Equity,’ according to the official statement.

McCaffrey stressed that UNICEF has a strong network of partnerships with the Government of India and expressed excitement at collaborating with ace musician Ricky Kej. Three-time Grammy Award winner Ricky Kej performed during the World Health Summit in New Delhi.

On UNICEF’s collaboration with Ricky Kej, McCaffrey stated, “I think one thing I would say, UNICEF has been in India for 75 years. So, we have a strong network of partnership across the Government of India, with Indian states and communities themselves, and then we’re so excited that we have such an advocate in Ricky Kej and in fact here for the summit, having the opportunity to listen to his music, which always not only entertains but challenges us to think about what’s happening in the world and what we can do to make the world better and for UNICEF that’s an incredible opportunity as we work with partners across India and across the world about how we make the world better for children.

She said that UNICEF has the opportunity and benefit of working for the whole child, which means looking at vaccines and nutrition. She stated that the first 1000 days of the child, health of the mother, giving the mother the ability to feed the child, are being discussed during the summit. She also lauded the efforts of India’s leadership, partners in communities for making the country polio-free in 2014.

When asked about the rise of vaccine-preventable illnesses in different parts of the world, Cynthia McCaffrey responded, “I would say three things. UNICEF has the opportunity and benefit of working for the whole child, and that means that we look at vaccines, but we also look at a child’s nutrition. Here at the summit, we’re speaking about the 1st 1000 days of a child, and so that means looking at the health of a mother and giving the mother the ability to feed the child, breastfeeding exclusively. So one, that whole child is important.

Speaking about UNICEF work with India and other partners, she said, “Secondly, UNICEF works closely with partners and so the Government of India, with governments around the world to build strong health systems that enable cold chains but also share information about balanced diets, and that’s something that India is doing very well is strengthening its health system and building that healthy diet.

And then third and final is working with communities themselves so that parents have the knowledge of what they need to raise a healthy child and really meet the rights of their children. And so those are the three things, UNICEF is doing here in India, but also across the globe.

On polio, India in 2014 was polio-free, and that was possible because of the leadership from the Government of India, partners in communities, partners like Rotary, and so we’ve really made incredible headway with those types of things,” she added. (ANI)