Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights of Refugee Women in Europe: rights, policies, status and needs. Literature review

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Why Do Mothers Die? The Silent Tragedy of Maternal Mortality

More than two decades after the launch of the Safe Motherhood Initiative, maternal health in many developing countries has shown little or no improvement. Year after year, more than half a million mothers continue to die in silence. The specificities of the complex cross-cutting issue only partly explain why tireless efforts have led to insufficient progress so far. While some success stories prove that results can be obtained quickly, the dissensions and deficiencies the Initiative has encountered have strongly weakened its impact. However, recent developments over the past 3 years allow us to foresee the silence will soon be broken. While advocacy begins to subsequently raise awareness, more financial means are mobilized. As a consensus on the priority interventions has finally been reached (Women Deliver conference, London, October 2007), more coordinated actions and initiatives are being developed. The strive for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals helps to create the political momentum the cause strongly needs to generate new leadership, develop and implement the adequate strategies. Sensible focus on resources and structure as well as innovative management will be crucial in that process

Commentary: Actions to end violence against women : a multi-sector approach

Many forms of violence affect women and girls, such as physical and sexual abuse, trafficking, female genital mutilation, early and forced marriage, murders in the name of honour or dowry, and sexual harassment and abuse by authority figures. Prevention is imperative, and promising programmes exist that need to be tested and scaled up. The UN’s post-2015 global agenda, currently under discussion, must include a target to eliminate violence against women and girls, which supports the actions outlined in this article

A new woman-controlled contraceptive vaginal ring: a global step forward

More than 40 years ago, the development of contraceptive vaginal rings began, based on the fact that the vaginal epithelium can absorb steroid hormones and the capacity of elastomers to release these hormones at almost constant rates. The growing interest in woman-controlled contraceptive methods has supported and accelerated the process

Caesarean section surgical techniques: all equally safe

Since 1985, a caesarean section rate of 10–15% has been deemed optimum by the international health-care community.1 When caesarean section rates rise towards 10% across a population, maternal and newborn deaths decrease; when they are higher than 15%, there is no evidence of reduced mortality.1 Complications of caesarean sections can be substantial and sometimes permanent for both mothers and babies, and can result in disability or death, especially in settings with inadequate facilities or capacity to undertake safe surgery and treat surgical complications

Missed opportunities in women\u27s health: post-abortion care

Around the world, 56 million induced abortions took place annually in 2010–14, which was about 25% of all pregnancies. Abortion rates vary widely across regions, do not differ significantly by income level or legal status of abortion,1 and depend on many factors, one of the key ones being a lack of access to modern contraceptives.1 Safe abortion, however, depends on the legal climate, and countries with restrictive abortion laws are far more likely to have illegal and unsafe abortions. Abortionrelated complications are an important and preventable cause of maternal mortality, accounting for 8–9% of maternal deaths worldwide,2 with 42 to 63 women dying out of every 100000 abortions. Globally, the rate of abortion-related deaths dropped by about 42% between 1990–94 and 2010–14, from 108 per 100000 women to 63 per 100000. The rate of such deaths is highest in Africa, at 141 per 100000 abortions.1,

Twenty five years fighting for women's health and rights : some progress but still a long way to go

The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of 25 years women’s health and rights, a difficult journey with steps forward and backwards since the landmark conference in 1994 when reproductive rights were for the first time on the menu. However, although great strides have been made in reducing maternal and child mortality since then, among others by the United Nations with the establishment of the Millennium Development Goals for 2015, showing that change is possible, many countries are still lagging behind in reaching the goals. While the new global architecture, in particular with the Sustainable Development Goals and the Global Strategy for Women’s, Children’s and Adolescents’ Health, ensures that these issues remain high on the political agenda, this paper argues that we must move from political commitment to action, via the creation and dissemination of research evidence. As the Founding President of the Ghent Africa Platform (GAP) at Ghent University, I still believe GAP has an important role to play regarding this international collaboration and dissemination of scientific knowledge