Recent media excitedly report on the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) contemplation of abandoning its decades-old “one-child policy.” However, the official press agency, Xinhua, merely wrote that the PRC is still “deliberating” on studies and whether to “relax” the policy or not. Xinhua reported the spokesman for the National Family Planning Commission as maintaining that […]
Last Wednesday, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) released its annual State of the World Population report, in which it called family planning a “fundamental human right” and underlined the need for increased investment in and a “rights-based approach” to family planning. Citing studies that show improved health, societal, gender, and economic outcomes when family planning […]
In a time of political, social, and economic turmoil, the focus on global health has blurred slightly. We’ve made great gains against polio, malaria, HIV, and a number of other diseases in the past decade, but there is, as always, much to be done. With tensions high across the Middle East and Europe, an election […]
In global health news this week, I have updates to previously covered topics. World leaders have committed money and support to family planning, spearheaded by the Gates Foundation. The CIA’s fake vaccination program, part of efforts to ferret out Osama Bin Laden, has contributed to a ban on polio vaccinations by the Taliban controlling the […]
At a TEDxChange webcast event last week, Melinda Gates announced that she would dedicate the next 30 years of her life to advocate for and support family planning. Asserting that birth control should not be a controversial issue, Gates discussed the implications of the dearth of family planning programs and services in the developing world–particularly […]
Thousands of Uzbek women secretly sterilized Evidence gathered by the BBC shows that, for at least the past two years, the government of Uzbekistan has been ordering physicians to secretly sterilize tens of thousands of women, often without their knowledge. “Every year we are presented with a plan. Every doctor is told how many women […]
The Internet has exploded over the past couple of days with news that Susan G. Komen, the largest breast cancer organization in the US, would halt funding for Planned Parenthood, the largest provider of reproductive health services in the US. A virtual uprising on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media platforms by Komen and Planned […]