We can't keep mum about this

By Elaine VanCleave

One in every four children around the world is chronically malnourished — a preventable condition. As a mother, that bothers me.

That is why I’m asking you to join me by signing a Mother’s Day card asking congressional leaders to invest in nutrition.

By investing $230 million this year in global nutrition programs for mothers and children, we can be on course to end hunger by 2030.

In 1999, I sat down with my member of Congress, not as a policy expert, but with the heart of a mother who abhorred the idea that 30,000 children were dying EVERY DAY from hunger and related preventable diseases. The debt-relief legislation I was asking him to champion helped start an exodus from hunger. 

Today, that horrible number has been halved, but millions of children still never reach their full potential and lack the nutrition they need to thrive. As a mother, that still bothers me. 

Add your name to the Mother’s Day card Bread for the World is sending Sens. Lindsey Graham and Patrick Leahy and Reps. Kay Granger and Nita Lowey — leaders who have the power to act.

I won’t stop advocating until no mother has to watch her child suffer from malnutrition. Our voices can and do make a difference. 

Elaine VanCleave is a Bread for the World member.