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New York, NY (June 8, 2016) – Last
night the NYC children’s healthcare nonprofit Children’s
Health Fund hosted their Annual Benefit at the Mandarin
Oriental Hotel. It was a spirited evening in support of
America’s underserved youth with luminaries from the worlds
of entertainment and politics in attendance among a packed
room of hundreds overlooking the skyline around Columbus
Circle.
Among the list of honorary chairs and attendees included:
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Musician, actor and
legendary celebrity advocate Harry Belafonte
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Mayor Bill de Blasio
and former Mayor David Dinkins
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Academy Award-winning
actor Morgan Freeman
Morgan Freeman delivered
heartfelt remarks detailing Belafonte’s illustrious career
before presenting him with Children’s Health Fund’s
Humanitarian Award. The audience was treated to footage of
Belafonte and a host of celebs singing “We Are the World”
before the night’s honoree described his meeting CHF
co-founder and president Dr. Irwin Redlener through the USA
for Africa campaign. Belafonte explained, “We had to reach
out to other segments of this society to guide us in this
effort,” and he described the evening as “an extension of
the experiences” he had with Dr. Redlener in the 1980s.
Mayor Bill de Blasio stopped by
to offer his support as well, quipping he wished a gossip
columnist was in the room because he was speaking next to
“the coolest table in New York” – seating Morgan Freeman,
Belafonte and former Mayor David Dinkins, who also offered
warm remarks on stage.
About Children’s Health Fund
Paul
Simon and Irwin Redlener, MD founded Children's Health Fund
in 1987 after touring the Martinique Hotel, a shelter for
homeless families in New York City, and witnessing the
conditions under which homeless children lived. The New York
Children's Health Project launched with one "big blue bus,"
a state-of-the-art mobile medical clinic that would bring
care directly to those children with the least access.
Over
the years, Children's Health Fund has replicated this
approach across the country. Today, the National Network
provides care through 25 innovative pediatric care programs
and affiliates that serve children in poor rural and urban
communities across the country. Each program is affiliated
with a major teaching hospital or community health center,
and reaches out to children in federally designated health
professional shortage areas. This network has cared for over
350,000 children in some of the most disadvantaged rural and
urban communities in the nation.
Children's Health Fund has also campaigned in support of
expanding health insurance coverage for low-income children,
as well as public health programs that provide a critical
safety net for millions of medically underserved children.
Children's Health Fund has worked in partnership with the
White House and Congress to promote access to health care
and solutions for homelessness, asthma, poor nutrition and
obesity. In 1994, Children's Health Fund launched Kids
First, Kids Now!, a public education and advocacy campaign
that focused national attention on the need for a true
health care safety net for all of America’s children. Kids
First, Kids Now! played a key role in the national advocacy
effort that resulted in the passage of the State Children’s
Health Insurance Program, the most important advance in
child health care access since the inception of Medicaid in
1965. |