Recently everyone’s favorite Hollywood activist, George Clooney, announced he contracted Malaria while visiting Sudan in early January. Don’t worry ladies, he’s made a full recovery and is already back to his suave, debonair self.

Clooney was in Sudan working to ensure peaceful and fair elections in the unstable region. He has continuously supported the need for increased availability to proper medication to combat malaria – an illness that kills nearly a million people every year, according to the World Health Organization.

In true Clooney style he’s managed to use his unfortunate bout with Malaria to raise awareness for the very cause he’s been spotlighting for years.

While it’s disheartening to know that it sometimes takes an A-List celebrity to educate and engage the masses, it’s encouraging to see someone take up a cause and make a difference whether they’re a big-time movie star or not.

Malaria is often associated with death, but why? It is certainly a serious disease but it is not untreatable. As Clooney said, “This illustrates how with proper medication, the most lethal condition in Africa can be reduced to a bad 10 days instead of a death sentence.”

Why then are one million people dying every year from a disease that can be easily treated with medication?

Similar questions can be asked about the tendency for Americans and essentially the rest of the world, to turn a blind eye to the egregious genocide committed by Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir.

Just as we allowed al-Bashir to commit crimes against humanity for far too long, we are now allowing millions to die for reasons that cannot be justified no matter how you spin it.

A recent campaign on Facebook (although not directly sponsored by the networking site), asked users to change their profile pictures to cartoon characters as a way to raise awareness for the fight against child abuse.

While “raising awareness” is important, it stops short of action. We must somehow communicate through this effort that without action our words mean nothing.

When a child dies from malaria every 45 seconds, awareness is not enough.

Students are historically known for being the first to stand up and say, enough is enough. From the American Civil Rights Movement to anti-war protests, college students are known for inspiring change and promoting justice.

As students, we must take that infectious passion and speak up for those who are suffering.

The first and easiest step in getting involved is to write our representatives and urge them to continue allocating funds to agencies that have proven they can stop the spread of malaria.

We must also urge our leaders to call on the rest of the world to come together in this fight, because it cannot be done alone. This is not a problem that can be corrected by America alone.

This is a global issue. More important, this is a human issue.