Updates

By: Mabel Bianco, President of Fundación para Estudio e Investigación de la Mujer – FEIM

Prior to the creation of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and particularly MDG 5 (to improve maternal health), there were many international agreements for improving the status of all citizens, including those focused on sexual and reproductive health and rights. Although these international agreements, including the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), Programme of Action (PoA) and the Beijing Platform for Action (PfA), preceded the MDGs, the responsibilities and commitments to sexual and reproductive health and rights that governments and donors established are broader than those encompassed in MDG5 and 5B. Read more...

Get Involved: Add Your Own Perspectives At The Conversations For A Better World Blog Series

By: Bridget Akudo Nwagbara, Chair of the Youth Health Workers Advocates, Nigeria – MNCH

“I had a dream to be the best that I can at anything I want to be….I couldn’t because I became a mother at 15 years. I never wanted the baby. Now, I have to cope with the demands of being a mother without going to school. That is not the life I wanted”…*Anne

These voices echo those of Nigerian youths who don’t have access to basic reproductive health choices today. They were never told what contraceptives were all about, where to get them, how to get them and how to use them. Then, the big question is: Why are they denied the right to decide freely and responsibly when to start having sexual relationships, when to have children, and how many children they want? The answers are not far-fetched and it is important we bring them to fore this week to celebrate World Contraception Day. Read more...

By: Lindsey Taylor Wood, Communications Associate at Women Deliver

Throughout the past week, the Social Good Summit was held in New York City to coincide with the UN General Assembly and served as a platform to highlight new initiatives and causes that are using social media to leverage support for global development issues. Read more...

VISIT THE FULL SERIES AT CONVERSATIONS FOR A BETTER WORLD

By: Janna Oberdorf, Director of Communications and Outreach at Women Deliver

Young people and contraception can be a tricky topic – for some reason, the idea that young people should have power over their sexuality and their reproductive health can be scary for decision-makers and people in power. But, when young people are able to choose whether, when and how many children to have and to protect themselves from unsafe sex – that’s a good thing. That choice not only improves young people’s health, it also affects their ability to stay in school, to get an education, to earn money, to improve their social and economic status, and to invest back into their communities, families, and countries. Basically, contraception is the key to their future. Read more...

By: Madeline Taskier, Strategic Partnerships Associate at Women Deliver

Housing 12 percent of the world’s population, sub-Saharan Africa bears 26 percent of the global disease burden. For women, the lifetime risk of maternal death in sub-Saharan Africa is 1 in 31 compared with 1 in 4,300 in industrialized nations. Despite the narrowed focus on healthcare access for girls and women, the public health sector alone cannot adequately provide services for the continent. Read more...

By: Maria Inés Romero (26, Paraguay) and Wieke Vink (20, the Netherlands), members of the Youth Coalition for Sexual and Reproductive Rights

This next blog in our series "2015+" is a conversation between two Youth Coalition members (ages 20 and 26) about youth sexual and reproductive rights and why they think it’s important to put young people at the heart of the next development agenda. Read more...

By: Madeline Taskier, Strategic Partnerships Associate at Women Deliver

In India, boys continue to be preferred over girls, permeating gender norms and attitudes throughout the country. Boys carry on the family name, don’t require expensive dowries for marriage, and have more opportunities in education and the workplace. In 2011, 914 girls were born to every 1,000 boys, and gender inequalities are only increasing. Read more...

By: Kristin Rosella, Program Associate, Strategic Partnerships, Women Deliver

Over the past several years, a new form of corporate social responsibility (“CSR”) has emerged—one in which the business world is donating more than money or products, but rather, the very expertise, knowledge, and skill that make businesses successful. The goal is to expand the traditional model of CSR to help nonprofits run more efficiently and effectively—that is, well, more like a business. This allows these organizations to reach more people, operate more quickly and cheaply, and save a greater number of lives. Read more...

By: Susana Edjang, Project Manager for Every Woman Every Child effort in the United Nations’ Secretary-General’s Global Health Team

As people across the globe deliberate, whose perspective should be sought out and how can their participation be ensured?

I would like to think that everyone – no matter the background, gender, ethnic group or age – stops to think about the value of the lives of those mothers, sisters, friends, partners and daughters, and sons, that someone just like us loses unnecessarily every day due to preventable causes. The good news is that today we are doing more than just thinking or talking about it. The Every Woman Every Child effort, spear-headed by the UN Secretary-General, aims to ensure that we all work together and that our efforts towards saving and improving the lives of women and children, are better coordinated and enhanced putting into action the Global Strategy for Women and Children’s Health. Read more...

By: Rati Bishnoi, Special Projects Intern at Women Deliver

For generations, men in the villages nestled in the remote mountains of the Ifugao province in the northern Philippines have used the “ayod” or hammock to carry the sick to hospitals and medical facilities. Now, this traditional “foot ambulance” is increasingly becoming the heart of a community-grown maternal health system that is saving the lives of women and girls and keeping families and communities intact in this rural area. Read more...

By: Kristin Rosella, Program Associate for Strategic Partnerships for Women Deliver

Thousands of women in low-resource areas of Mexico, Nicaragua, and Tanzania are now getting life-saving cervical cancer screenings through a unique public-private partnership between Grounds for Health, a U.S.-based nonprofit organization, and coffee-farming cooperatives. Read more...

If questions like why women make up the majority of unpaid workers worldwide and why only one in five lawmakers globally are women leave you perplexed and—quite frankly—mad, tune and make your voice heard during the World Bank’s Open Forum, “Gender – Getting to Equal,” on Sept. 20th and 21st. Read more...

By: Madeline Taskier, Partnership Coordinator at Women Deliver

Decades of conflict between the military junta and ethnic minority groups in Burma have internally displaced approximately 440,000 people from their homes and forced them into informal settlements, but a network of community health workers are working to make a difference. The Mobile Obstetrics Maternal Health Workers (MOM) Project provides high-impact and mobile emergency obstetric care, family planning, and essential pre-natal care to women and families in these settlements. Read more...

By: Dr. Frederick Torgbor Sai, a Ghanaian family health physician and honorary co-chair of Women Deliver 2010 conference

The eight MDGs are too well known to warrant repetition here. MDG 5 asked for a reduction of the maternal mortality ratio by three quarters between 2000 and 2015. Other goals related directly to MDG 5 are focused on child health, improvement in women’s status and the reduction of poverty. The attainment of all the other MDGs would also influence MDG 5, as would its attainment also impact all the others. Read more...

By: Gill Greer, Director-General of IPPF

In 2010, after too many years of neglect and denial, the value of womens and girls lives was finally recognised by Heads of State at the MDG summit, in the Muskoka G8 initiative, and in the Global Strategy for Womens and Childrens Health, Every Woman Every Child. Billions were pledged and promises made, by donor and partner governments, foundations, civil society, NGOs, professional groups and others. Yet two initiatives, which drove the largest commitments to womens and childrens health in many years and inspired optimism for a better world, came from outside the MDG and ICPD frameworks. But this is not surprising when we consider recent history. Read more...

By: Mariko Rasmussen, Communications Specialist, and Janna Oberdorf, Director of Communications and Outreach at Women Deliver

We are back in the office after an exciting few days at the United Nations. Government representatives, heads of UN agencies, advocates, and youth from across the world gathered in New York July 25-26, 2011 for the United Nations High Level Meeting on Youth. The theme of the High Level Meeting was “Youth: Dialogue and Mutual Understanding” and began on July 25 with two thematic panel discussions focusing on strengthening international cooperation and addressing challenges regarding youth and social integration, employment, poverty eradication and sustainable development. Read more...