Brown in 100m war on malaria

Gordon Brown has announced that Britain will provide 20 million extra bed nets to help in the fight against malaria - one sixth of the estimated world shortage.

Writing in The Sun newspaper today, the Prime Minister said that now was the time to act on malaria as "every year we wait, another million more people will die".

Although malaria has been eliminated from Britain and other western countries it continues to spread in Africa and other developing countries, killing mainly women and young children. Eradicating malaria is one of the eight UN Millenium Development Goals agreed in 2000 and today the PM urged other world leaders to take action, saying:

"I am proud to say that Britain is once again taking the lead...by supplying the funds for 20 million more bed nets. That's one in six of the 120 million bed nets the world needs. And I'm challenging the rest of the world - governments, business and anyone else who wants to end this killer disease - to join us in this effort by donating money for nets."

Later tonight the PM will feature in a special edition of American Idol aimed at raising funds to tackle malaria and poverty in the developing world. In his video message, the PM will ask viewers to play their role in eliminating the disease, saying: "With 120 million more nets all families could sleep safe at night".

Full article can be viwed at http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1019085.ece

Every child deserves to sleep safe in bed at night