"Literacy is the best remedy" is the theme of this year’s International Literacy Day, which is celebrated annually on 8 September.
Under the auspices of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), International Literacy Day this year aims to focus on the important relationship between literacy and health, with a strong emphasis on epidemics and communicable diseases such as HIV, tuberculosis and malaria.
UNESCO reports that “research has repeatedly demonstrated the direct correlation between people’s level of literacy and their chances to maintain good health. For instance, a study conducted in 32 countries shows that women with secondary education are five times more likely to be informed about HIV/AIDS than women who are illiterate…”
Some 774 million people, roughly one out of every five adults in the world, can still neither read nor write; 75 million children are excluded from the educational system, according to the UNESCO Institute for Statistics.
2003-2012 is the UN Literacy Decade.
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