Posted on 08/23/2005 11:36:37 AM PDT by the anti-liberal
There are fears that the exclusion of sexual and reproductive health from the United Nations Millennium Development Goals will accelerate the rate of unsafe abortions and maternal mortality rates in poor countries, writes MEERA MURUGESAN
GIVE a woman adequate access to contraception and she’ll have the chance to space out her pregnancies, keep herself and her children healthier and avoid unsafe abortions.
It’s a simple and logical link but one that policy makers in many countries prefer to ignore as sexual and reproductive health is no longer the compelling issue it was once seen to be, says Dr Steven Sinding (right), director-general of the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF).
This lack of focus on sexual and reproductive health, and in turn, the lack of funding it now receives, has much to do with the fact that it has been excluded from the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), explains Sinding, who was in Kuala Lumpur recently for a regional council meeting.
The goals, or the MDGs, are the world’s time-bound and quantified targets for addressing extreme poverty in its many dimensions and by 2015, all UN member countries have pledged to achieve them.
There are currently eight specified goals: eradicating extreme poverty and hunger; achieving universal primary education; promoting gender equality and empowering women; reducing child mortality; improving maternal health; combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases; ensuring environmental sustainability and developing a global partnership for development.
The IPPF sees the strong need to include a ninth MDG – universal access to sexual and reproductive health services, a target that countries reached a consensus on at the landmark 1994 Cairo International Conference on Population and Development.
The Cairo Program of Action recognised the necessity of women’s empowerment and reproductive rights to improving the health and wellbeing of the world’s citizens.
“The MDGs have come to define the international development agenda,” says Sinding, “it’s the mechanism the World Bank uses to channel funds and what many of the bilateral development agencies and even countries themselves use in their development planning.
“Everything is framed by the MDGs, the goals are what countries adopt and focus on, so if it is not an MDG, it is in effect outside the global agenda and that is what has happened to what used to be called family planning and is now referred to as sexual and reproductive health,” he explains.
The reason the Cairo goal was dropped from the MDGs was because of an unexpected and successful lobbying effort by the Vatican in particular, says Sinding, and the effects are now being felt.
Across the board, the IPPF has noticed a 30 per cent decline in resources going towards reproductive health services, he says.
With the dawn of the new millennium, there’s also a realisation that population pressure is not the global issue it once was so the case for funding programmes related to family planning are seen by many politicians as not compelling enough anymore.
“But the failure to address sexual and reproductive health issues will directly affect the achievement of the other MDGs such as combating HIV/AIDS and reducing infant and maternal mortality rates,” says Sinding.
“For example, with HIV/AIDs, we are not going to be able to make much headway in reducing the rate of new infections if we don’t address the issue of contraception.
“Similarly, there is a crucial link between maternal and infant mortality rates and the use of contraception or family-planning methods and this too needs to be recognised and addressed.
“We know that the survival chances of a child born more than two years apart from his sibling, are significantly higher than those who are born less than two years apart.”
The absence of family planning methods mean birth intervals is much shorter and infant mortality and maternal mortality rises as well.
When women have children too close together, their bodies do not have sufficient time to recover from the pregnancies and their health becomes affected, says Sinding, and likewise, in the absence of strong support for contraceptive services, the abortion rate will continue rise faster and maternal mortality resulting from unsafe abortions is also going to be higher.
There are already many countries in Africa, for example, where the shift in focus away from family planning has meant that contraceptive use has declined and this in turn has resulted in an increased in maternal and infant mortality rates.
And as the focus on HIV/AIDS has increasingly moved towards treatment rather than prevention, the gap between this area and sexual and reproductive health has also widened, says Sinding.
“But even given this scenario, the possibility of universal access to sexual and reproductive health services being included as a goal in the MDGs is remote,” he says.
What the IPPF does hope for is at least a recognition of the importance of the Cairo consensus as a target within one of the existing MDGs or an explicit agreement on a set of indicators that have to do with universal access to reproductive health services within the MDGs.
“To be frank, I don’t believe any of the MDGs can be achieved if we do not continue to address the issue of reproductive health,” says Sinding.
“Of course, it is possible to address the issue indirectly through the other goals, but it cannot substitute for it being a goal.”
What are the odds some liberal nuts in the "homosexual movement" are going to turn this one into an unholy nightmare... ?
A ping-a-ling for you- I'd be interested to hear your take on the matter.
Stealth KKK? Get 'em where they're most vulnerable- before they're born..
"Planned Parenthood: Fighting Births of Dark-Skinned People Since 1923."
shhhh, no one is supposed to know that!
Besides your jingle nees just a bit of fixin up....
Planned Parenthood: Preventing Births of Dark-Skinned People Since 1923, and killing the unborn since 1973.
Has a tinge better ring to it dontcha think?
R3
Now, how do we get them out of the federal budget?
Moral Absolutes Ping.
My take?
Get the US out of the UN and the UN out of the US.
The UN is, IMO, almost pure evil. Poetic sounding words, beneficial sounding goals. But we all know what the road to hell is paved with.
"Reproductive health" means abortion. "Family planning" means abortion and various types of contraception up to and including pressured sterilization.
The best way to promote real reproductive health is to promote chastity until marriage and lifelong fidelity within marriage. The best way to promote maternal and infant health is to promote non-dictatorships. Look at Zimbabwe and Mugabe - Zimbabwe used to export food, it's a fertile breadbasket. Now it's a basket case, due to a megalomaniac fiend who is supported by other (noun deleted) in the UN.
No more pouring (our) money down rat holes.
Freepmail me if you want on/off this pinglist.
Note: There was a GREAT article about handouts and Africa - by an African - a few weeks ago on FR. A fantastic article. He begged - PLEASE leave us alone and quit trying to "help" us with more money. Such a good article. I wish I could post a link to it. Maybe someone else will remember it.
As it is:
Hi, Third World! Welcome to OUR world. Thanks to the U.N., all this can be yours...
Thank you very much, Mrs D. - great list. If only the health clinics in the African countries the UN wants to "help" had this list prominently displayed for everyone to see.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.