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WEAPONS OF MASS SALVATION

In the October 26th issue of The Economist (www.economist.com), Columbia University professor Jeffrey Sachs argues that we need to devote as many resources to the war against want as to the war against terror. He observes that while the US government is prepared to spend $100 billion to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, it has been unwilling to spend more than 0.2% of that sum on weapons of mass salvation -- the arsenal of life-saving vaccines, medicines and health interventions, emergency food aid and farming technologies that could avert literally millions of deaths each year in the wars against epidemic disease, drought and famine.

Sachs concludes...

"Our interconnectedness on the planet is the dominating truth of the 21st century. One start result is that the world's poor live, and especially die, with the awareness that the United States is doing little to mobilise the weapons of mass salvation that could offer them survival, dignity and eventually the escape from poverty."