Welcome to CENFACS’ Online Diary!
22 July 2020
Post No. 153
The Week’s Contents
• Healthiness Projects in a Summer of Covid-19 Compliance
• Virtual Summer Festival (Seven Days of Development in July 2020) – In Focus for this Year: Health Economics – How to make health economic work for the poor and neediest
• Happiness and Healthiness Budgets 2020
… and much more!
Key Messages
• Healthiness Projects in a Summer of Covid-19 Compliance
Healthiness Projects are the second part of our Summer Programme; the first part being Appeal Projects. The Appeal Projects are currently running under the banner of Humanitarian Relief Appeal to Africa. One of these Appeal Projects is Distress-free Life from Coronavirus in Africa.
CENFACS’ Distress-free Life from Coronavirus in Africa, which is a Health-enhancing Appeal, will help to alleviate distress and hardship by bringing hopes and aspirations to the distressed Children, Young People and Families in dire need of help during this turbulent time of Covid-19 and beyond.
Further information about this Health-enhancing Appeal and the way of supporting it can be found at http://cenfacs.org.uk/supporting-us/
As to the Healthiness Projects, we have integrated the Covid-19 constraint in them. This integration implies that each of the projects making healthiness this Summer will be Covid-19 secure and compliant.
For more on the 2020 Healthiness Projects, please read them under the Main Development section of this post.
• Virtual Summer Festival (Seven Days of Development in July 2020) – In Focus for this Year: Health Economics – How to make health economics work for the poor and neediest
The 12th Edition of our Summer Festival is starting today as scheduled. This week’s five days of the Summer Festival starting from today will be devoted to the following:
Day 1: Understanding of Health Economics (22/07/2020)
Day 2: Formulation of the argument that Covid-19 is a health and economic threat (23/07/2020)
Day 3: Evidence or data gathering about Covid-19 induced poverty and hardships (24/07/2020)
Day 4: Argument testing (25/07/2020)
Day 5: Healthcare policies and poverty (26/07/2020)
Part of the Festival will be set for virtual sessions. We have planned to have virtual sessions on the 22nd, 23rd, 24th, 27th and 28th of July 2020. On the 25th and 26th of July 2020, there will not be online video meet-up or virtual sessions. However, the Festival will be still open for participants to provide their thoughts and comments via e-mail, contact form and text messages.
For those who are making any contributions in the form of thoughts and comments, it will be good to stick to the daily themes as planned. Likewise, it makes easier for the good running of the festival to be short and precise in making thoughts or comments. This will allow to quickly capturing the impact they will be making. This will facilitate to measure the Festival’s aim and objectives as well.
People can still join the thoughts at any time and day once started. They can as well share the festival views with those who may be interested in.
Thank you!
• Happiness and Healthiness Budgets 2020 –
Budgeting and Delivering Happiness and Healthiness in a Summer of Covid-19
In our project planning process of Summer of Healthiness Projects, we started a few weeks ago by budgeting Summer Holidays with what we call Happiness Budget. In that process, we included the Covid-19 effects into a family budget. We publicised two examples of budget planning: a Covid-19 Family Protection Expenses Budget, and a Covid-19 Secure and Happiness Budget for an Ordinary Family.
This week, we are continuing the budgeting process while starting to deliver on other parts of the Happiness Projects as Summer Holiday has just begun for most children, young people and families. In this continuing process, we are going to take into account other economic factors (like inflation, currency price, the effect of economic recession, purchasing power parity, etc.) when constructing your Happiness and Healthiness budgets.
We understand that not everybody does understand some of the complex jargons and the mechanics of household financial statements like balance sheet, profit and loss account, budgets, etc. Likewise, we appreciate that not everyone can grasp all the financial information on the other financial documents they receive (such as bills, receipts, bank statements, etc.).
This is why we are available to discuss people’s Happiness or Healthiness or Summer Holiday Budgets for those who want us to do so. For those who are struggling with their Happiness or Healthiness Budgets especially the numerical aspects, CENFACS is prepared to look into their Summer Budgets.
We can handle all of the areas or items of their Happiness Budget. However, we will put a particular emphasis on the following six areas of Happiness Budget which are: income, health, lifeline support, giving or recycling, credit payments and refunds, and unrestricted (freedom) payments and receipts.
The above six accounts cover the six items of happiness which make our Season of Happiness. Where possible, the effects of climate change will be included to reflect a budget of a changing climate as well.
Those who would like to discuss with us their Happiness or Healthiness Budget, please feel free to contact CENFACS.
Extra Messages
• Covid-19 Hub for Poverty Reduction
CENFACS’ Covid-19 Hub for Poverty Reduction is a newly set up point where most of CENFACS’ work on Covid-19-induced poverty and hardships will be regrouped. The new hub will hold and provide information and serve as a directory of inquiries about CENFACS’ work on Covid-19 for both internal and external purposes.
For those who would like to know the state of progress about CENFACS work on Covid-19 (such as the Campaign for Resilience against Covid-19); they can check it through CENFACS’ Covid-19 Hub for Poverty Reduction.
For further details about Covid-19 Hub for Poverty Reduction, please contact CENFACS.
• All-in-one Impact Feedback: Only One Week to Go!
We have almost one week left for our Analytics month. We are for the third time appealing to you to tell us in your own words and numbers your perceptions, feelings and experiences about the programmes and projects we ran in the last 345 days preceding the beginning of July 2020.
Although we have selected 12 initiatives for Impact Feedback One and 9 ones for Impact Feedback Two for monitoring and evaluation purposes, we are not expecting people to provide feedback on all of them. People can only feedback on the project(s) and programme(s) they benefited from, supported, recommended users to us or interacted within. We again suggest picking up ONLY 1 or 2 initiatives for feedback.
Please feel free to say what you experienced.
Again, thank you for your experiential support!
• Building Back Better Africa in Happiness
Covid-19 may have disrupted happiness in Africa. To be happy and healthy in Africa may have changed in the new Age of Covid-19. Africa may need to build back better with happiness in the post-lockdown period.
So, as part of our Season of Happiness in a Summer of Healthiness, we are questioning and searching ways in which Covid-19 has affected happiness in Africa and how Africa can build back in happiness. There could be some changes in happiness in Africa due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Before the coronavirus pandemic stroke; there were debatable arguments about happiness in Africa. For example, Helliwell et al. argue in their 2020 World Happiness Report (1) that
“Sub-Saharan Africa is not only the areas in the world with low happiness scores, but also a region in which happiness differences between the city and countryside are most pronounced in favour of city life” (p. 40)
The report goes on in explaining that African countries with most pronounced urban-rural differences in life evaluation include: Angola, Congo Brazzaville, Benin, Central African Republic, South Africa, Gambia, Niger, Liberia and Egypt.
Now that Africa is battling Covid-19, what is the state of happiness in Africa?
Building Back Better Africa in Happiness implies taking into account the variables of predictors of life evaluation. One of these predictors is healthy life expectancy. Making sure that the components of healthy life expectancy are part of the strategy for building back better Africa could help to insure happiness in Africa today and tomorrow.
To enquire or make queries about Building Back Africa in Happiness, please contact CENFACS.
(1) Helliwell, J., Layard, R., Sachs, J. & De Neve J. E. (2020), World Happiness Report (2020), New York: Sustainable Development Solutions Network
Main Development
• Healthiness Projects in a Summer of Covid-19 Compliance
• • Understanding CENFACS’ Healthiness Projects
Covid-19 has challenged our perception of happiness and healthiness. It has shaken the fabric of our poverty-relieving systems. Happiness and healthiness can have different meanings for those in most in need and poverty in today’s prevailing conditions of Covid-19.
Despite that, it is possible to find health relief and happy fulfilment while still controlling the Covid-19 factor this Summer 2020. It is possible to make the conditions of being physically, mentally and socially sound better this Summer.
This Summer, we are going to focus on ways of finding this health relief, on Healthiness in a Summer of Covid-19. In other words, our centre of interest is on what will keep children, young people and families healthy (or unhealthy) over Summer and beyond in the conditions of Covid-19, especially its far-reaching and adverse effects on many aspects of life. In order to keep them healthy, there is a need to budget and deliver Healthiness or Healthiness Projects.
CENFACS’ Healthiness Projects are poverty-relieving responses to bring freedoms from diseases (including epidemics, virus like Covid-19) while reducing misery for poor children, young people and families over the summer period and beyond.
The underlying principles or philosophy of these life evaluation projects are in line with the main factors or indicators that define happiness as both a social and personal concept as explained in successive World Happiness Reports edited by Helliwell et al. (2).
These editors distinguish the social foundations of happiness from personal happiness, although the two are complementary. They argue that the science of measuring and understanding subjective well-being and happiness indicates that to be happy, one needs to meet the following six key variables or predictors that explain happiness differences among countries which include: income (Gross Domestic Product per capita), healthy life expectancy at birth, social support (having someone to count on in times of trouble), generosity, freedom to make life choices and trust (perceptions of corruption).
When talking about key determinants of happiness and misery, they again argue that happiness is caused by factors such as income, employment, health and family life.
CENFACS Healthiness Projects address the issues encapsulated inside the above variables and factors, particularly healthy life expectancy in this Summer 2020. The projects will help to keep in mind the needs of the CENFACS Community in terms of healthiness.
Keeping people healthier is to reduce as much as possible health and sanitation poverty and misery among them. Healthiness is about ending poverty and misery. As we have brought in the exceptional sanitary circumstances the world is facing with Covid-19, Healthiness is finally about ending poor health and poor sanitation amongst children, young people and families in an era of the coronavirus pandemic.
(2) Helliwell, J., Layard, R., Sachs, J. (2017, 2018 & 2019), World Happiness Reports (2017, 2018 & 2019), New York: Sustainable Development Solutions Network
• • Delivering Healthiness with 6 Projects for 3 Beneficiaries
6 Projects to bring Healthiness to 3 beneficiaries: Poor Children, Young People and Families
Summer is a holiday season of the year during which most of the schools are closed and families with children and young people in much needed help are forced to stay with them and or use this time of the year to take holiday. The usual routine of educational/academic establishments with their recreational activities is scaled down.
This Summer is even special since many children, young people and families (CYPFs) were and have been forced to stay home during the lockdown due to the Covid-19 outbreak. Yet, these CYPFs are in need of seasonal activities and programmes for improving their well-being, healthiness and happiness.
There are ways of ensuring that summer stays an interesting and enjoyable period for Multi-dimensionally Poor Children, Young People and Families. There are things that can be done to make summertime a season of Happiness, Peace, Vulnerability-free, Healthiness Protection and Sustainability. There should be projects that can help them to adapt and mitigate the adverse effects of the coronavirus pandemic.
The following CENFACS suite of summer 2020 initiatives can help in achieving some healthful and helpful summer plans, goals and outcomes in the new Age of Covid-19.
CENFACS Healthiness Projects include:
1) Healthy Summer Break
2) Holiday without Coronavirus
3) Summer Harmony with Nature
4) Hot Barriers against Covid-19
5) Networking for Protection and Safeguarding against Covid-19
6) Community Care and Health Responsibility for Covid-19 Control
There is a link between these six initiatives. For example, in order to have a holiday without coronavirus one may need healthy break, build harmonious relationships with the nature, keep human barriers of protection against Covid-19, network for protection and safeguarding and act in a responsible way in the interest of their own health and public health.
These projects are the combination of skills, knowledge, resources, tools, tactics, boosters and tasters for the relief from Covid-19-induced poverty and hardships. In the preparation of our Summer 2020 programme for CYPFs, we have considered the effects of Covid-19. The consideration of the effects of Covid-19 all across is what makes Summer 2020 so special. All the six Healthiness Projects will be Covid-19 Secure and Compliant.
This is done to help improve life evaluation while taking actions to enhance the same life in the context and constraint of Covid-19 dominance. In this way, Summer can be a season of Healthiness NOT of Misery for un-served and under-served children, young people and families who are at the same time victims of the adverse and far-reaching effects of Covid-19.
They are the victims of adverse and far-reaching effects of Covid-19 because Covid-19 is an economic and health threat. It has taken them economically and healthily in hostage by affecting the way they dress, eat, house, educate, entertain, care for their health and body, look after their homes, and above all the way they pass their Summer holiday.
For details about CENFACS Healthiness Projects 2020 and to access them, contact CENFACS.
Help CENFACS keep the Poverty Relief work going in 2020.
We do our work on a very small budget and on a voluntary basis. Making a donation will show us you value our work and support CENFACS’ work, which is currently offered as a free service.
One could consider a recurring donation to CENFACS in the future.
Donate to support CENFACS!
FOR ONLY £1, YOU CAN SUPPORT CENFACS AND CENFACS’ PROJECTS, JUST GO TO http://cenfacs.org.uk/supporting-us/
Thank you for visiting CENFACS website and reading this post.
Thank you as well to those who made or make comments about our weekly posts.
We look forward to receiving your regular visits and continuing support throughout 2020 and beyond.
With many thanks.
