{"id":154483,"date":"2017-06-16T06:01:29","date_gmt":"2017-06-16T04:01:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/germistoncitynews.co.za\/154483\/princess-charlene-writes-special-oped-international-day-african-child\/"},"modified":"2017-06-16T14:12:33","modified_gmt":"2017-06-16T12:12:33","slug":"princess-charlene-writes-special-oped-international-day-african-child","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/news-headlines\/2017\/06\/16\/princess-charlene-writes-special-oped-international-day-african-child\/","title":{"rendered":"Princess Charlene writes a Special OpEd for International Day of the African Child"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>OpEd from HSH Princess Charlene<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p><div class=\"stream-item stream-item-in-post stream-item-inline-post aligncenter\"><\/div>\n<p>Water &#8211; it\u2019s everywhere, and in just about everything and everyone on this wonderful planet of ours.\u00a0 70 per cent of the Earth\u2019s surface is covered by oceans, seas, rivers, lakes, and glaciers.\u00a0 Water\u2019s in the air we breathe, the ground we walk on, and we humans are pretty much made up of water too.\u00a0 Water, in short, is life.\u00a0 And for a long time, water was my life.\u00a0 Discovering the joy of swimming inspired me to dedicate 20 years of my life to training and realising my dream to be become an Olympic swimmer. Training and competing in the water taught me the importance of discipline, respect for oneself and others, team spirit and dedication. Most significantly, I saw how learning to swim could not only change lives, as it did mine, but also save lives.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p><div class=\"stream-item stream-item-in-post stream-item-inline-post aligncenter\"><\/div>\n<p>My love affair with the water took me to sporting heights and it remains a huge part of my life whether surfing or paddleboarding, racing on a water bike for charity, crawling lengths in the pool or splashing around with my children.\u00a0 Despite that, I\u2019m also all too aware of the risks associated with water.\u00a0 Learning to respect the water, and learning how to swim and stay safe in it can reduce these risks and give us great confidence and freedom.<\/p>\n<div class='tie-fluid-width-video-wrapper tie-ignore-fitvid' style='margin-bottom: 30px;'>\n\t\t\t<iframe style='width: 100%; min-height: 300px; aspect-ratio: 16\/9;' src='https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/R6vxzr37FeA' loading='lazy'><\/iframe>\n\t\t<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>During my competitive swimming career, it was important to me to share my passion and knowledge of the water with children, and teach them how to be safe in the water.\u00a0\u00a0 Now I have my own children, one of my top priorities has been to teach them to swim.\u00a0 It is an essential life skill, like learning to safely cross a road.\u00a0\u00a0 Far too many people, often children, drown because they can\u2019t swim. In South Africa, where I grew up, drowning is the second leading cause of accidental death after road accidents. It\u2019s not much talked about. You could say it\u2019s a hidden epidemic in a supposedly dry continent. In fact, Africa has vast swathes of seas, lakes and rivers.\u00a0 In coastal cities like Dakar, Durban, Dar Es Salaam and Freetown, you often find the shoreline crowded with people but as most of them can\u2019t swim, they simply dip their toes at the water\u2019s edge. The trouble is that it doesn\u2019t take much for a child, or an adult, to slip and drown in a few centimetres of water or be swept out by a rogue wave or current.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_297982\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-297982\" style=\"width: 520px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-297982\" src=\"https:\/\/benonicitytimes.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/26\/2017\/06\/EM3_2134-copy-Small-520x400.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"520\" height=\"400\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-297982\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">HSH Princess Charlene teaching South African children first aid and CPR in Daveyton, Johannesburg.<br \/>Photo Eric Mathon \/ Palais Princier<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that drowning claims the lives of more than 60,000 children under the age of five and more than 360,000 people globally each year. It claims a similar number of lives today as diseases such as diarrhoea and measles did in the 1970s and 1980s. As with those then leading killers, there must be a concerted and coordinated effort to prevent deaths by drowning. Africa\u2019s drowning death statistics are sadly the highest in the world but they are such an everyday occurrence that they barely get a mention in local media.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>As Patron of the South African Red Cross Society, I am promoting water safety and learning to swim, as well as first aid and CPR training &#8211; for children and by children.\u00a0 Education like this is crucial to saving lives and stopping the needless grief that afflicts the families of those who drown.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class='tie-fluid-width-video-wrapper tie-ignore-fitvid' style='margin-bottom: 30px;'>\n\t\t\t<iframe style='width: 100%; min-height: 300px; aspect-ratio: 16\/9;' src='https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/AdTDScnLdr0' loading='lazy'><\/iframe>\n\t\t<\/div>\n<p>In 2012, I set up my Foundation to teach children essential water safety skills and how to swim and so far we\u2019ve reached over 300,000 people, mainly children, in 30 countries.\u00a0 Equipping young people with essential life skills will not just save lives, it will prepare them for a future in which they can be active and responsible citizens. For as Nelson Mandela reminded us in 1995, \u201cOur children are the rock on which our future will be built, our greatest asset as a nation. They will be the leaders of our country, the creators of our national wealth, those who care for and protect our people\u201d. This is why, this year, we organized the Riviera Water Bike Challenge, a 21km ProAm relay race from Nice to Monaco with 10 teams of 5 competitors, an event which saw David Coulthard, Nico Rosberg, Paula Radcliffe, Ryk Neethling and Percy Montgomery among others battle it out along the Cote D\u2019Azur to be crowned champions. The project raised the funds to design and establish the first aquatic rescue in Burkina Faso, an ambitious project for my Foundation in partnership with the Red Cross Monaco and the Red Cross Burkina Faso.<\/p>\n<p>On this Day of the African Child, as we celebrate the joy, laughter and future of our precious children, I urge the world\u2019s governments to put water safety and the elimination of drowning on the development agenda.\u00a0 If countries, NGOs, and international bodies join forces, drowning need no longer be a silent killer, whether in Africa or elsewhere.\u00a0 Together we can save lives \u2013 one person, one family, one community at a time.\u00a0\u00a0 Water is precious and so are our children.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.fondationprincessecharlene.mc\">www.<em>fondationprincessecharlene<\/em>.mc<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Princess Charlene Foundation is working\u00a0together with Bloomberg Philanthropies in the USA and the RNLI in the UK to raise awareness of drowning as a hidden killer and this is why the Princess has chosen to speak out water safety on the Day of the African Child.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"stream-item stream-item-below-post-content\">\n<div class='tenancy_slot tenancy_slot_1 jannah_ad' style='display: none;' data-query-id='f385910881104229908fbef29055ac2f'><\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Her Serene Highness, Princess Charlene of Monaco, writes a special message to children around African and the world on International Day of the African Child.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":154484,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"hasGravity":false,"cxt_article_byline":"OpEd from HSH Princess Charlene","cxt_disable_google_ads":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6182,3686,8097,7,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-154483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-home-page","category-lifestyle-news","category-lifestyle-and-health","category-local-news","category-news-headlines"],"amp_enabled":true,"category_labels":{"Category":"Lifestyle","SubCategory":"Lifestyle and Health"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/60"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154483\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/154484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/germiston-city-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}