Updates

By: Smita Gaith, Women Deliver

Today, TedxChange and Melinda Gates launched the No Controversy website, in the hopes that people around the world will share their stories, read about the experiences of others, and become educated on the importance of contraception and family planning. The launch, which is available on Livestream, comes three months ahead of the July 11 Family Planning Summit that will take place in London. The Summit, supported by the Department for International Development (DFID), The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and other partners, seeks to generate political commitment and greater resources to meet the family planning needs of women in some of the least wealthy countries by 2020. Read more...

When ABC News launched their "Be the Change: Save a Life" series, they also partnered with the Acumen Fund and GOOD to launch a "Moms Matter" competition to raise attention to the hundreds of thousands of women who die in pregnancy and childbirth. They asked for submissions in the form of Tweets and print ads, guerrilla marketing campaigns and videos, essays, and a host of other creative ideas with one unifying purpose: to stand up as a global community and to say with one voice, "Enough is enough: moms matter." Read more...

Tomorrow night, Friday 17th December 2010, ABC News will kick of a new series called, "Be the Change: Save a Life" at 10pm. This series will be a yearlong project to focus attention on the diseases and health conditions that disproportionately afflict the world's poorest people, and it will be led by "World News" anchor Diane Sawyer and ABC News Chief Health and Medical Editor Dr. Richard Besser. Read more...

60 Be The Chang Friday (Rev) from ABC News Promos on Vimeo.

Akimbo, the blog for the International Women's Health Coalition, just posted a fantastic video interview with Graça Machel, a renowned advocate for women's and children's rights.

Late last month, Population Action International (PAI) showed the world premiere of their documentary The Silent Partner: HIV in Marriage. The screening drew more than 170 community leaders, members of the media, and local and international advocates together in Nairobi, Kenya.

Guatemala has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in Latin America, where death during childbirth is 20 times more likely than in the developed world. The majority of these deaths are preventable, with access to sufficient medical care — a challenge for many Guatemalans, particularly those in remote areas.

The BBC has produced a new multi-series documentary called “Survival” that includes a 45-minute look at maternal health in Bangladesh. To capture the true story, the filmmakers traveled to a remote area in the North East of Bangladesh and filmed the labor of a young woman, Morjina, in her small hut with the aid of traditional birth attendant, or dhai.

There was a great feature in the Washington Post this weekend all about maternal mortality in Sierra Leone. Unfortunately, Sierra Leone has an extremely high maternal mortality rate -- 1 in 8 women die during childbirth.

To celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, animator Seth Brau brought the important words to life with motion graphics. Check out the video below to see his moving interpretation. And remember that maternal health is a human right. Health care improvements must come within a broader context of efforts to promote human rights, reduce poverty, and foster equality between men and women.

Check out this video about the success of Kangaroo Mother Care in Malawi.

Watch this video clip of Martha Stewart talking about the dinner hosted by Sarah Brown, Wendi Murdoch and Queen Rania last week in NYC.

Check out this hysterical and slighty unorthodox video from Oxfam and The White Ribbon Alliance.

Facing the Truth, a 30-minute televised drama on the importance of HIV tests for pregnant women in Cambodia won a coveted Freddie Awards at this year's celebration. The Freddie Awards are given in the US for international health and medical media achievements--Facing the Truth won under the category of Prevention. The film was shot in and around Phnom Penh in ten days and has been shown at hospitals and health centers nationwide during a period of about two years. This movie was shown also on the Cambodian Television Network in June 2008, and more than two million citizens watched it. For more info on the movie, click here.