MEXICO CITY - After 12 hours of back-to-back interviews with Mexico City press, Circle of Blue team members made a mad dash back to their rooms to change clothes, grab laptops and head down to the Hotel Condesa Cinema to present a special preview of Tehuacán: Divining Destiny. Just four weeks earlier, a Circle of Blue field crew landed in Mexico for ten days of reporting for the pilot production. In the dim lights of the underground club, seven plasma screens glowed with Brent Stirton’s photographs from the front lines of the world water crisis. Staff welcomed over 150 of Mexico City’s best-known artists, entertainers, creative professionals, editors and philanthropists, as well as international water experts and scholars who were in town for the World Water Forum. I started the the presentation at 10:30 p.m., following an opening address by Dr. Scott Whiteford and the 13-minute documentary from the Tehuacán assignment. We’re enthused and tired.
NEW YORK - Ok, one more thought from the Time Global Health Summit: I can’t help but comment on the “red carpet” press event at the Alicia Keys “Black Ball,” a fundraiser to bring AIDS medications to children in Africa.
Through an informal poll as we waited for the stars to arrive and parade in front of the cameras, I didn’t find a single reporter who was aware of the Time Health Summit’s mission or details. In fact, few seemed to know of Ms. Keys’s AIDS efforts. It was comical to see the give and take between the stars and the paparazzi. They need each other to survive — one only hopes that editors take time to read the press releases and get the captions right. “Alicia, look over here!”
(photo: J. Carl Ganter/Circle of Blue)
NEW YORK (November 2, 2005) - Missed the story again… A TV business reporter pursued the avian flu story with Virgin Atlantic Chairman Richard Branson here at the Time Global Health Summit. The resulting exchange made the headlines as Branson elaborated on his firm’s preparation for a possible flu outbreak by stockpiling vaccine for its airline staff. But the long-term news, I thought, was Branson’s ambitious call for an international “war room” to monitor, coordinate and respond to global health issues, particularly in Africa. It makes perfect sense — use the technologies of military, shipping and media logistics to manage myriad, complex responses to avian flu, pandemics, famine and drought.
photo: Evan Agostini/Time
