Support Women's Health: Help Us Reach our Twitter Milestone!

EngenderHealth is just about 500 followers away from reaching a new milestone on Twitter: 5,000 followers!

To give us a little boost toward that goal, a generous donor has agreed to provide a gift to support our work to improve women's health around the world.

So here's the deal... Between now and the moment we reach 5,000 followers (or until we hit our gift ceiling), an anonymous donor will give:

- $2 for every new @EngenderHealth follow

- $1 for every retweet

The donation will help advance our mission of improving sexual and reproductive health for women and girls around the world, including through investments in maternal health, family planning, HIV and AIDS, and gender equality.

It's simple ... and free. Show your support for women's health today by sharing this post to your followers or retweeting us. Or, if you're feeling generous, you can also make an online donation on EngenderHealth's web site.

A huge thanks to all of our followers for your continued support. And don't forget to follow us on Facebook, along with our brand new Pinterest account.

House, Senate at Odds on FY2013 Global Family Planning Budget, UNFPA, Global Gag Rule

The House and Senate appropriations committees approved their respective fiscal year 2013 budgets for global family planning assistance, setting the stage for heated negotiations later this year.

While the House voted to cut international family planning funding to $461 million (nearly 25% below current levels and more than $180 million below President Barack Obama’s request), the Senate is looking to increase the family planning budget to $700 million. The proposed cuts by the House would deny contraceptive services to some 7.7 million women and couples, resulting in 2.2 million more unintended pregnancies and more than 745,000 unsafe abortions, according to an analysis by the Guttmacher Institute.

The two houses are also at odds over funding the UN Population Fund (UNFPA). The House seeks to defund the UNFPA (the world’s largest multilateral source of population assistance), while the Senate allocated $44.5 million to support it.

A third point of contention in the bill involves the Global Gag Rule (GGR), a policy that has been proved to harm women’s health worldwide. Also known as the Mexico City Policy, the GGR denies U.S. aid to any overseas organization that promotes or offers abortion services, even if the services are legal in the country and funded with non-U.S. money.

While the House Appropriations Committee proposed to codify the GGR, the Senate Appropriations Committee voted to permanently repeal the GGR, through an amendment introduced by Committee Chairman Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ). First introduced by President Ronald Reagan in 1984, the policy has been repealed and reinstated by different administrations through executive order.

The GGR has had a detrimental effect on women’s health. A recent study by researchers at Stanford University found a dramatic rise in induced abortions in the African countries that experienced the greatest funding cuts as a result of the policy. Reduced access to reproductive health services may have led women to substitute abortion for contraception. Every year, more than 20 million women resort to unsafe abortions, which account for 46,500 annual deaths—13% of all maternal deaths.

The full House and Senate will vote on their respective bills before ironing out a single budget for signature by President Obama.

On Alice Radio: A Conversation with Pam Barnes

“Our goal is to be sure that women can have the number of children they want, and not the number of children that their circumstances dictate.”

~ President Pamela W. Barnes

Last week, Alice Radio (97.3) in San Francisco featured Pam Barnes on its Sunday Magazine program to discuss the top reproductive health challenges facing women today and what EngenderHealth is doing to address them.

Listen to the  interview here. Or, skip to the topics that interest you:

01:30 …on advocating for national policies that promote women’s health
03:06 …on global progress in women’s health

05:25 …on the benefits of investing in women

07:17 …on engaging men to support women’s health

09:45 …on EngenderHealth’s work to address women’s health through comprehensive & integrated services

11:30 …on meeting the needs of women living with HIV, including family planning and preventing mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV

13:12 …on Gender Matters, our teenage pregnancy prevention program that addresses gender norms among adolescents in Austin, Texas

15:45 …on why issues across the globe should matter to Americans

18:25 …on what YOU can do to support EngenderHealth’s work to improve women’s reproductive health

Maternal Health: On the Mind and In the Media

Mother’s Day may be over, but our work to improve mothers’ health isn’t!

Check out what we’ve been reading here at EngenderHealth—a selection of our favorite articles on and around Mother’s Day.

1. In the Huffington Post, the head of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) reminds us that even strong mothers need continued support in reproductive health care.
2. New estimates from the United Nations reveal a near 50% decline in annual maternal deaths between 1990 and 2010.
3. Ms. Magazine explains why celebrating birth control on Mother’s Day isn’t as counterintuitive as it sounds.
4. New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof highlights the plight of women living with fistula. EngenderHealth has also provided nearly 20,000 fistula repairs around the world to date.
5. In Newsweek magazine, philanthropist Melinda Gates unveils her new crusade and why she’s making family planning her “signature issue.”
6. Women Deliver celebrated the lifesaving work of midwives on May 5, the International Day of the Midwife.
7. USA Today discusses the U.S. ranking in the annual report on the State of the World’s Mothers.

Global Progress in Reducing Maternal Mortality

The number of women who are dying in pregnancy and childbirth is on the decline, according to new estimates released by the United Nations today.

Over the last 20 years, the number of annual maternal deaths has dropped by nearly 50%, falling from 543,000 in 1990 to 287,000 in 2010. This achievement is a testament to the global efforts undertaken to support mothers' health.

While global progress has been made, particularly in East Asia, many countries will not achieve Millennium Development Goal 5, which seeks to reduce maternal mortality by three-quarters by 2015. Most of these countries are in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The new estimates are developed by the World Health Organization (WHO), UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), UN Population Fund (UNFPA), and the World Bank.

Read the full report here. Also, learn more about how EngenderHealth supports maternal health programs around the world.

This Mother's Day: Plant a Flower to Support Maternal Health!

Mother’s Day is just around the corner! Check out this video on what you can do to honor a special mother, grandmother, sister, or friend, while also supporting the health of mothers around the world.

It's simple: Just plant a FREE flower in our virtual garden and post a photo. The honoree will receive a personalized video letting her know that you are thinking of her.

Best of all, for every flower planted, a generous donor will give $5 to EngenderHealth’s maternal health programs to support women around the world!

What’s the Word on Family Planning? What U.S. Leaders Are Saying

As the budget debate ramps up for fiscal year 2013, officials from the U.S. Department of State are promoting priorities for global health, including for reproductive health. Below are excerpts from recent public statements made by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Administrator Rajiv Shah, and Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues Melanne Verveer on the critical importance of family planning:

Hillary Rodham Clinton, U.S. Secretary of State
In response to Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) on the costs of cutting global family planning programs, during a February 28 Senate Appropriations Committee hearing:

The cost is financial. The cost is in women’s lives. The cost is to undermine what many of the very same opponents claim as their priority, namely to prevent abortions. We want to stay focused on improving maternal and child health and there is no doubt at all that family planning services are absolutely essential to improving both maternal and child health. Working through our government, with other governments, with NGOs [nongovernmental organizations], with expertise, capacity, proven track records, we have made a big difference in women’s health.

Global estimates, Senator, indicate that by helping women space births and avoid unintended pregnancy, family planning has the potential of preventing 25 % of the maternal and child deaths in the developing world.

Family planning is the best we way we have to prevent unintended pregnancies and abortion. I know that it is a very controversial issue but numerous studies have shown that the incidence of abortion decreases when women have access to contraception. Therefore, I strongly support what this administration is doing in trying to provide the means to improve the health of women and children around the world.

Dr. Rajiv Shah, Administrator, USAID
In response to Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) on making family planning less controversial, during a March 6 hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee:

We know that our history of program support in family planning has been one of our most successful areas of work.

We have seen in country after country a common pattern that gets you to a place where you have a better demographic situation for development, and that is first, a significant reduction in child mortality. And we know when that happens, people and families invest more in kids, get them in school and it becomes a pathway out of poverty. And then it is generally followed by a long-term and more effective approach to family planning and reducing the total fertility rate in countries. And the combination of those things has been a major part of the development success story in nearly every success story we see around the world. It’s incredibly important.

We’ve seen in our own programs that effective birth spacing reduces maternal and child mortality by 25 percent and we think they are a relatively noncontroversial way to achieve that outcome, simply as part of having trained community health workers, the same people visiting homes making sure kids who are malnourished have access to protein and micronutrients, also engaging in conversations about just the facts related to the effectiveness of that approach.

Melanne Verveer, U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues
In a March 15 interview with CNN: 

Family planning is one of the best public health interventions that can be made. It makes such a difference in a woman’s life for her to be able to have the wherewithal—the family planning contraceptives available so that she can decide the size and the spacing of her children.

It is about her health. It is about her future. It is about the betterment of her family. And where it has become available in ways in which women want to utilize it, they know it is so important to the quality of life for them. So certainly in societies there are those who say, “Well, there's no place for this.” But I think we all know this a sound public health tool. It is one we support. It is part of the Global Health Initiative that the United States has been supporting.

It brings down the numbers of abortions around the world. And it is just unfathomable that women can't get the access that they need so that they can have healthier lives, healthier families, and be able to do a great deal more for their families, for their communities, and for themselves because they're deprived of it. So we need to be making every effort to make it more available.

Family planning is one of the best public health interventions that can be made. It makes such a difference in a woman’s life for her to be able to have the wherewithal—the family planning contraceptives available so that she can decide the size and the spacing of her children.
It is about her health. It is about her future. It is about the betterment of her family. And where it has become available in ways in which women want to utilize it, they know it is so important to the quality of life for them.
So certainly in societies there are those who say, “Well, there's no place for this.” But I think we all know this a sound public health tool. It is one we support. It is part of the Global Health Initiative that the United States has been supporting.
It brings down the numbers of abortions around the world. And it is just unfathomable that women can't get the access that they need so that they can have healthier lives, healthier families, and be able to do a great deal more for their families, for their communities, and for themselves because they're deprived of it. So we need to be making every effort to make it more available.

EngenderHealth Receives Award from Manhattan Young Democrats

On March 21, EngenderHealth received an award from the Manhattan Young Democrats (MYD) for our work to improve the quality of reproductive health care around the world. EngenderHealth President Pamela Barnes accepted the award on behalf of the organization at Engendering Progress, MYD’s third annual event honoring women leaders, activists, and entrepreneurs.

MYD is an all-volunteer organization committed to educating and activating young progressives for social change. Also in attendance at the event was Hollaback!, a movement dedicated to ending street harassment using mobile technology, and Catalyst, a nonprofit organization expanding opportunities for women and business.

True Heroes of the Congo

When Dr. Christophe Kimona treated a young mother for her fistula recently, he repaired more than just her body—she said he restored her spirit.

“I am motivated by compassion for women who have no other sources of support,” Dr. Kimona said. “It is satisfying to aid my fellow countrymen and women.”

His colleagues agree that “it is the work of the heart.”  Dr. Kimona, Dr. Mukwege, Dr. Amisi, Dr. Nembunzu, Dr. Ahuka, Dr. Manga, Dr. Mubikayi, Dr. Tchangou, Dr. Denon, Dr. Aime-Manga—these are the names of some of the dedicated surgeons who are healing women living with obstetric fistula in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). They are few in number.

Patients come to them in despair, many having been abandoned by their husbands or family and sometimes having lost their will to live. Many have endured years of isolation because of their fistula, a devastating condition in which a hole develops between the birthing canal and the bladder or rectum, causing chronic incontinence. Fistula can result from prolonged or obstructed labor when women lack access to emergency obstetric care.  In the Eastern Congo, a region plagued by years of conflict, fistula has also been caused by sexual violence. 

Yet, in the face of the most difficult circumstances, these surgeons, together with their teams of nurses, anesthetists, social workers, and administrators, find a way every day to restore dignity and hope for women.

These are the individuals whom U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton calls “true heroes” in the Congo—a selfless breed of surgeons, nurses, and other staff who dedicate themselves to giving women with fistula a second chance at a fulfilling, productive life.
 

A Community of Practice

Last week, for the third year in a row, these surgeons came together with staff from the Ministry of Health and others who provide care and advocate for women with fistula to review progress in providing these services in the Congo. Coinciding with International Women’s Day, the March 8-9 meeting was hosted by Fistula Care (managed by EngenderHealth and funded by USAID) and Panzi Hospital, a facility supported by the project in Bukavu, South Kivu Province of Eastern Congo. 

On March 8, Secretary Clinton sent a message to the participants, commending them for their dedication: “Facing difficult challenges every single day, the surgeons and health care providers at this meeting are truly heroes, committed to supporting Congolese women and girls by providing the high-quality fistula services that are desperately needed to restore health, dignity, and lives.”

The community of practice (CoP) included fistula surgeons, nurses, anesthesiologists, social workers, and administrators, many of whom are women and all of whom work in fistula repair and prevention. Also present were local partners, Ministry of Health representatives, and global players such as the United Nations Population Fund, World Health Organization, and U.S. Agency for International Development.

Fistula Prevention, Surgeon Training, and a National Strategy for Fistula

Participants discussed the successes and obstacles of working in an environment where access to resources for surgical care is challenging. The surgeons emphasized time and again the importance of increasing access to quality emergency obstetric services to prevent fistula from happening in the first place. Mme Lucie Zikudieka from PROSANI, a USAID-funded integrated health project, reviewed with participants the recent national revision to the partograph and the plans for its introduction. The tool is used to monitor and manage women in labor and delivery to ensure that appropriate actions are taken if complications arise. 

Professor Serigne Magueye Gueye, an eminent Senegalese urologist, led a discussion on training fistula surgeons and introduced a recently completed, internationally recognized Competency-based Training Manual for Fistula Surgery. Participants agreed on the need for a formalized training strategy for fistula surgery as part of a national strategy to address obstetric fistula, which participants also reviewed.  Women’s health advocates have long fought for a high-level plan, which would establish policies to increase access to quality fistula services.

In all, the annual CoP meetings have provided a space for surgeons, practitioners, and policy makers to work together toward a unified vision for addressing obstetric fistula. Dr. Denis Mukwege, Founder and Director of Panzi Hospital, made an impassioned plea to the Ministry of Health to urgently finalize and implement the strategy. Every day of delay means more women continue to experience this devastating condition.  Fistula Care will work with the Ministry and other key stakeholders to advance the strategy within the next few months. For more information, visit www.fistulacare.org.

EngenderHealth’s Postabortion Care Work Wins Spot in Top 50 Ideas for Women & Girls

EngenderHealth’s postabortion care work has earned a spot on Women Deliver’s Top 50 most inspiring ideas and solutions for women and girls around the world.

Launched in honor of International Women’s Day, the competition saw hundreds of submissions from 103 countries. More than 6,000 individuals voted for their favorite ideas and solutions. Thank you to all of our supporters who voted for us and made this happen!

Our Work in Postabortion Care

For nearly two decades, EngenderHealth has partnered with developing country Ministries of Health to strengthen and modernize health systems to provide effective postabortion care. Abortion is severely restricted throughout most of the developing world, where more than half of all induced abortions are unsafe. Performed by unskilled people, often in unsanitary environments, such abortions account for roughly 46,500 deaths per year.

EngenderHealth’s programs have trained more than 15,000 clinicians—from community-based health workers to physicians—to use low-tech, lifesaving tools, such as manual vacuum aspirators and misoprostol, for treatment of complications from abortion. Healthcare providers are trained to provide counseling for family planning and referrals for other reproductive health services to improve women’s health over the long term. With timely care from a trained provider, this program prevents the needless deaths of thousands of women from unsafe abortion.

For more on our postabortion care work, visit our website.