United Nations official visiting Alabama to investigate 'great poverty and inequality'Updated 11:49 AM; Posted 8:17 AM
By Connor Sheets csheets@al.com
http://www.al.com/news/index.ssf/2017/12/united_nations_official_visiti.html#incart_river_homeA United Nations official arrives in Alabama this week to investigate poverty, inequality and "barriers to political participation" in the state.
Philip Alston, UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, will visit Alabama on Thursday and Friday as part of a 15-day tour of the U.S. that also includes stops in California, West Virginia, Puerto Rico, Atlanta and Washington, D.C.
"Some might ask why a UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights would visit a country as rich as the United States. But despite great wealth in the US, there also exists great poverty and inequality," Alston said in a statement.
Alston will spend Thursday in Lowndes County, where he will be looking at issues like health care, access to clean and safe drinking water, and sanitation.
The Guardian
reported in September on a study exposing the fact that a small number of people have tested positive for hookworm - a parasitic disease found in impoverished areas around the world - in Lowndes County.
During his Alabama visit, he will also look at voting rights, political participation and "government efforts to eradicate poverty in the country, and how they relate to US obligations under international human rights law."
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