Making family planning accessible in resource-poor settings

It is imperative to make family planning more accessible in low resource settings. The poorest couples have the highest fertility, the lowest contraceptive use and the highest unmet need for contraception. It is also in the low resource settings where maternal and child mortality is the highest. Family planning can contribute to improvements in maternal and child health, especially in low resource settings where overall access to health services is limited. Four critical steps should be taken to increase access to family planning in resource-poor settings: (i) increase knowledge about the safety of family planning methods; (ii) ensure contraception is genuinely affordable to the poorest families; (iii) ensure supply of contraceptives by making family planning a permanent line item in healthcare system's budgets and (iv) take immediate action to remove barriers hindering access to family planning methods. In Africa, there are more women with an unmet need for family planning than women currently using modern methods. Making family planning accessible in low resource settings will help decrease the existing inequities in achieving desired fertility at individual and country level. In addition, it could help slow population growth within a human rights framework. The United Nations Population Division projections for the year 2050 vary between a high of 10.6 and a low of 7.4 billion. Given that most of the growth is expected to come from today's resource-poor settings, easy access to family planning could make a difference of billions in the world in 2050

Dietary intake and habits of South Asian immigrants living in Western countries

Previous reviews have indicated that immigration from South Asian to Western countries leads to unhealthy changes in diet; however, these reviews have been limited by the methods used in some included studies. This critical narrative review summarizes findings from original research articles that performed appropriate statistical analyses on diet data obtained using culturally appropriate diet assessment measures. All studies quantitatively compared the diets of South Asian immigrants with those of residents of Western or South Asian countries or with those of South Asian immigrants who had varying periods of time since immigration. Most studies examined total energy and nutrient intake among adults. Total energy intake tended to decrease with increasing duration of residence and immigrant generation, and immigrants consumed less protein and monounsaturated fat compared with Westerners. However, findings for intakes of carbohydrate, total fat, saturated fat, polyunsaturated fat, and micronutrients were mixed. Studies that examine food group intake and include South Asians living in South Asia as a comparison population are needed