23. October 2009
The 15th anniversary of Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) Plan of Action
The ICPD, held in Cairo in 1994, was considered a groundbreaking effort for shifting population policy discussions away from simply slowing population growth to enhancing individual health and rights while focusing on social development.
Fifteen years on, the realities of 2009 are different from those of 1994. At least 1.5 billion people aged 10 to 25 — the largest generation of young people in history — will need sexual and reproductive health services, says the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). Globally, there are about 33 million people living with HIV, reports the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS or UNAIDS, with 2.7 million new infections in 2007, most of which are sexually transmitted infections. Every year, more than half a million women die in pregnancy or childbirth, including 67,000 from unsafe abortion. Additionally, six million suffer injury, illness, or disability. In September, UNFPA organized Global NGO Forum Aims to Strengthen Partnerships, Advance Sexual And Reproductive Health. The forum of about 400 delegates was preceded by a youth summit, where leaders under 30 called for cultural, legal and political changes to confront stigma and promote reproductive health. During the forum, NGOs called for more funding for women's health as way to lift families and communities out of poverty. The Berlin Call to Action NGOs urged immediate national, government and international action to:
- Guarantee that sexual and reproductive rights, as human rights, are fully recognized and fulfilled, through legal reforms and new family policies;
- Invest in comprehensive sexual and reproductive health information, supplies and services as a priority in health systems strengthening, by increasing access for all (especially in emergency settings) to family planning and skilled maternal and newborn health care, and to HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment services, and by addressing unsafe abortion as a public health and human rights issue;
- Ensure the sexual and reproductive rights of adolescents and young people, by removing barriers to their access to information and services and empowering them to make policies and informed decisions about their own lives;
- Create and implement formal mechanisms for meaningful civil society participation in programs, policy and budget decisions, monitoring and evaluation, by protecting advocates as human rights defenders, involving young people, marginalized groups and NGOs in policy dialogue and guaranteeing them autonomy; and
- Ensure that donor contributions and national budgets and policies meet the needs of all people for sexual and reproductive health and rights, especially during times of economic stress.
More: www.globalngoforum.org