 When a COVID vaccine arrives, UNICEF stands ready to deliver it around the world. And UNICEF workers go a long way to make those deliveries. Last year, UNICEF helped vaccinate 45% of the world's children against deadly diseases. UNICEF does whatever it takes to reach the most remote villages and the most vulnerable children. The Bridge Fund has been a long-standing partner in this work as a lifeline to children, fast-tracking over $250 million worth of vaccine purchases. We thank our investors and supporters for making this possible, and will continue to provide the accelerated financing that keeps children safe. You've just seen a small window into the type of incredible work UNICEF does in 190 countries around the world, which the Impact Fund for Children is proud to support. I'm Christina Shapiro, and I'm the president of the Impact Fund for Children at UNICEF USA. The fund started 10 years ago to use innovative investing practices to speed the procurement and delivery of key supplies and programs that enable UNICEF's important work. Our main investment tool, the Bridge Fund, fronts pledged donor dollars so UNICEF can put those dollars to work faster in emergency situations and speed up the delivery of education, health, and social services that support children to survive and thrive. We do this by raising a pool of protected grant funding from generous donors. We then borrow against that capital at a rate of $3.5 for every grant dollar, and then allocate the resulting loan money where it's needed most. Along with saving more lives, investors get a return of capital and a return on capital. And they appreciate how far their dollars go and are attracted by our strong track record. Of the hundreds of millions of dollars invested in the Bridge Fund, we have reported zero losses over the last decade. In fact, this year marks the 75th anniversary of UNICEF, as well as the 10-year anniversary of the Impact Fund for Children's Bridge Fund. In a year like 2020 where the needs were higher than ever, the Impact Fund stepped up to the challenge, delivering a record $93.3 million to support UNICEF's work, bringing our aggregate activity since inception to over $450 million. But this, unfortunately, is still no time to celebrate, as the secondary effects of the pandemic continue to affect children and women at an alarming rate. I want to share a few reflections that are top of mind for me as we seek to continue expanding our impact amid the urgency that this ongoing pandemic calls for. The first reflection I want to focus on is the importance of time. The Impact Fund for Children saves lives by moving money more quickly. That is our guiding principle. And that is because when a disaster strikes, speed and expediency of funding are critical. The Bridge Fund is set up to respond quickly, so we have a competitive advantage in fulfilling a focus area around disaster relief. Specifically, our support lets UNICEF buy and deliver supplies when they are needed, not when the donor money comes in, which can be months after it is pledged. Time is also a critical factor when it comes to health-related needs, which is why 95% of the Bridge Fund's allocations in 2020 went directly to support emergency situations or health-related needs. As we all know, the COVID-19 pandemic has not only proven to be one of the most pressing global challenges of our lifetime, but it is a crisis where time really, really matters. The Bridge Fund has mounted a response that includes quicker delivery of vaccine cold chain equipment, those boxes that keep the vaccines cold, vaccine purchases, and personal protective equipment for frontline workers, most of whom are women. In getting supplies to the places that they're needed the most, the Bridge Fund has helped to stop the spread of the virus, which has resulted in human lives saved and a quicker end to the pandemic. In terms of our COVID-19 emergency response, we sprang into action in May 2021. As India experienced the worst COVID surge seen anywhere. If you recall at that time, about three people were dying every minute in India, which is why we accelerated $6 million a month sooner in order to help procure many critical supplies. Amongst the supplies that we purchased were two oxygen generation plants that each support 500 beds. If you do the math, over a thousand patients had access to oxygen a full month earlier, clearly a life or death situation. I want to move to the second reflection. And that is how UNICEF helps the most vulnerable, including women and girls. Why do we do that? Because we know women and girls experience more of the negative impacts of humanitarian crises, poverty, lack of infrastructure and lack of economic opportunity. Let me bring that to life for you. In eight out of the 10 homes without running water, girls and women are responsible for lugging those heavy containers over rough terrain. That is a lot of lugging. And it totals about 200 million hours per day gathering water, which is one of the many reasons girls are less likely to attend school and more girls are likely to drop out of school. Girls and women are also bearing the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has exacerbated inequities and reinforced gender inequalities. Some of the challenges that we have seen include one, an uptick in unpaid care work, which is disproportionately done by girls and women. Second, an increase in gender-based violence with cases of domestic violence up as much as 30% in some countries. Third, greater risk on the front lines of the outbreak, given that women account for roughly 70% of health workers globally and do the majority of support jobs at health care facilities. And lastly, lack of access to education with 11 million girls at risk of never returning to school due to the COVID-19 school closures. So how is the Bridge Fund helping to solve some of these challenges? In addition to working to end the pandemic, which would certainly help ameliorate many of the challenges that I outlined previously, the Bridge Fund accelerates funding for programs that specifically support women and girls, such as programs that address child marriage. This year, the Bridge Fund accelerated over $700,000 to help end child marriage by enhancing legal and political actions and providing education to empower adolescent girls. You might ask yourself, what is one-year matter in funding this type of program anyway? Well, we already talked about how COVID-19 aggravated many of the conditions that could lead to child marriage. And let me give you an example of a specific country. In Malawi alone, it is estimated that 40,000 girls got married and 13,000 got pregnant in the first COVID-prompted school closure last year. So in many ways, we are racing against time and the Bridge Fund is a key accelerant in that critical race. I want to move on to the final reflection and that is to talk about the importance of vaccines in thriving communities. The Bridge Fund supports a number of program areas that UNICEF focuses on, but I'm going to focus specifically on vaccines and that's because they save and improve millions of children's lives every year. Children who receive routine immunizations against diseases such as measles, rubella, polio and smallpox do better in school, which has been proven to have intergenerational economic benefits. And for those of you who don't know, UNICEF is the largest single purchaser of vaccines, immunizing nearly half of the world's children every year. And since its inception, the Bridge Fund has proudly accelerated funds to purchase and deliver countless vaccine doses to countries all over the world. In light of the pandemic and its disastrous secondary impacts on children, UNICEF is leveraging its vaccine expertise to procure and deliver COVID-19 vaccines as well. And to date, the Bridge Fund has deployed $86 million to support these efforts by accelerating country preparedness, vaccine purchases and to facilitate in-country delivery that help vaccines actually turn into vaccinations. Finally, I want to highlight that UNICEF uses a gender lens to drive an uptick in under-five immunizations by engaging women in under-vaccinated communities. And that's because a gender lens is not only an enabler, it is a key goal of vaccination efforts. And that's because immunizations, both routine vaccines for under-fives, as well as the COVID-19 vaccine, uplift communities, which inherently uplift women and girls who are often and unfortunately the most vulnerable members of these communities. In closing, I want to invite all of you to get involved and to learn more about the Bridge Fund, which accepts contributions of any size, from $1 to hundreds of millions of dollars from those who have the means to support at that level. I also want to invite you to stay tuned for updates from the Impact Fund. One of our guiding principles is innovation, and you can expect to see us launch other funds that invest in different ways in the coming months and years. Thank you.