As some experts have noted, the Reach Every Mother and Child Act of 2015 is likely to accomplish a lot of good, helping to save 600,000 mothers and 15,000,000 children by 2020 according to USAID’s estimates. Right now the bill has a small number of bipartisan sponsors in the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Though there are differences between the House and Senate versions, the act generally implements a strategic approach to ending preventable maternal, newborn, and child deaths in target countries. This involves:

  • Establishing a Child and Maternal Survival Coordinator to foster broad coordination with other governments, organizations, and institutions

  • Scaling up effective, evidence based interventions with a focus on country ownership

  • Designing, implementing, monitoring, and evaluating programs to improve program sustainability and outcomes

  • Creating better public-private financing mechanisms


Given the magnitude of this legislation, I think it is justifiable to take action to support it, though as a Center for Global Development writer points out, it may be worthwhile spending time considering which performance metrics are used to evaluate the program.


To support or comment on this bill:

  • Use the form here to quickly write and automatically send letters to your Senators and Representatives


If you’d like to do even more:

  • contact the Foreign Policy aides in your members' offices

  • have a conversation with them about co-sponsoring these bills.

 


If you'd like more guidance on taking action, send an email to Ken Patterson (kpatterson@results.org)


Comments3
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Just called my senators.

So here we go. EA's do not generally think seriously about political action. Is it time?

There's been more attention to this recently. Some EA organizations doing policy work.

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