NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

Pink joins UNICEF in fight to end child malnutrition

Trailblazing pop star Pink saw firsthand severely malnourished children during a recent visit to Haiti as a part of a UNICEF program to provide therapeutic food packets to children in need.

The singer, whose given name is Alecia Moore, was named a UNICEF ambassador Monday to help promote a new effort to encourage physical activity in young children in the United States and at the same time raise money for nutritional, vitamin-rich peanut paste to be delivered to malnourished children all over the world.

Moore is the national spokeswoman for the UNICEF Kid Power Band, which is a child-friendly fitness band that encourages exercise through an interactive app. Kids can earn points by doing things such as taking 12,000 steps a day or completing a goal. As the children earn points, UNICEF’s partners, including Target, Disney and Star Wars: Force for Change, will provide the funds needed to send the food packets to places such as Haiti.

If you bought an album last week, chances are it was Adele’s ‘25’

Nearly half the albums sold last week in the United States were by Adele.

That’s an especially dramatic way of looking at the success of the British singer’s “25,” which sold 3.38 million copies in its first seven days of availability, according to Nielsen Music – an enormous number that few in the struggling record industry likely thought possible in today’s environment.

Adele’s feat breaks the previous one-week sales record, set in 2000 when *NSync sold 2.42 million copies of its album “No Strings Attached.” That means that “25” – sales of which made up 41 percent of all U.S. album purchases between Nov. 20 and 26 – is now the fastest-selling album since Nielsen began tracking music sales in 1991.

Vindicator wire services