Earth Protect Blog

Besides her careers as a singer-songwriter and actress, Mandy Moore has quietly carved out another role as spokeswoman for global humanitarian efforts such as clean water and fighting malaria, taking her to remote villages in African countries and, this week, to the Clinton Global Initiative meeting in New York.

Part of a crop of teen female singing stars that rose a decade ago, Moore explained in an interview with the Associated Press that her work for such causes as helped keep her life in the entertainment world in context.

"It gives me balance and perspective," she said by telephone from New York. "It's sort of given me an understanding of the other side of my job — that it gives me the platform and reach that I can continue to spread the word on issues that I'm passionate about. They sort of go hand-in-hand."

Moore, now 27, has since 2008 voluntarily represented Population Services International, a Washington-based organization, in its child survival programs. She has helped launch and raise money for initiatives to help the organization provide insecticide-treated mosquito nets for children with malaria, anti-tuberculosis efforts, and for providing clean water. On Wednesday night, she recounted seeing how Pur, a water-filtering product made by Procter & Gamble, helped make dirty water drinkable on one of her Africa trips.

"She was very moving, talking about her own experiences," said P&G's Greg Allgood, who heads the consumer product maker's not-for-profit safe drinking water program. "She expresses herself better than a scientist like me. I can talk about the parasites; she talks about it from a very human perspective."

Moore also "draws a whole new audience" to humanitarian causes, Allgood said, adding: "My daughter thought it was pretty cool."

"I feel it shouldn't even be an issue; all of as human beings should have access to clean water," Moore said. "Unfortunately, that's the not the case for many people in the world."

She recalled a Sudanese man pointing to silt and other contaminants filtered out by the Pur packets and saying: "That stuff is in our bellies."

Moore has also traveled to Cameroon and the Central African Republic for PSI, and has volunteered time for other causes such as promoting cervical cancer education for the Gynecologic Cancer Foundation and GlaxoSmithKline.

http://articles.sfgate.com/2011-09-22/entertainment/30192664_1_clean-water-pur-dirty-water