Leading up to Mother’s Day on May 13, the Huffington Post’s “Global Motherhood” section, in partnership with Mothers Day Every Day, an initiative of the White Ribbon Alliance and CARE, is publishing opinion pieces from a diverse group of people. The following are summaries of two of those opinion pieces.

• Helene Gayle and Theresa Shaver, Huffington Post’s “Global Motherhood”: “[T]he White Ribbon Alliance and CARE came together to create Mothers Day Every Day, a U.S. advocacy initiative that brings together a bipartisan group of former administration officials, members of Congress, and advocates committed to improving the survival and health of mothers and newborns,” Gayle, president and CEO of CARE, and Shaver, president and executive director of the White Ribbon Alliance, write. They add, “Funding for global health, and more specifically maternal, newborn and child health, is among the most cost-effective, life-saving and security-enhancing investments the U.S. can make today. These investments emphasize measured outcomes and accountability, save lives, empower economies, and continue to bring stability to many areas of the world” (5/7).
• Carolyn Miles, Huffington Post’s “Global Motherhood”: Miles, president and CEO of Save the Children, discusses the organization’s 13th annual “State of the World’s Mothers” report, saying it “shines a spotlight on the lifelong, if not deadly, impact chronic malnutrition has on millions of children across the globe.” She says the report identifies the “Lifesaving Six,” “a set of affordable nutrition interventions that often cost less than $20 per child to deliver,” including “breastfeeding, complementary feeding, zinc, iron folate, vitamin A and good hygiene.” These solutions, along with “a larger package of nutritional interventions,” “are readily available and have the greatest potential to save lives now,” Miles says, adding, “We already are seeing progress” (5/8).