A Rights and Health Agenda for the Next Administration

CONTACT:

Kelly Castagnaro, International Women’s Health Coalition (IWHC), 212-979-8500

New York, NY – The next U.S. president can best create a more secure, healthy and prosperous world by securing women’s rights and health worldwide, two international advocacy groups said today.

In a paper released by the International Women’s Health Coalition (IWHC) and commissioned by the Better World Campaign, IWHC President Adrienne Germain said global advancement had been “hampered by politics and ideology” in the United States for the past eight years with deadly results.

The HIV/AIDS pandemic now disproportionately affects women, she said; a woman dies every minute from pregnancy-related causes; violence affects one in three women; and the legal rights of women are widely denied while young girls continue to be sexually exploited. At the current rates of progress, UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to improve women’s and children’s health will not be achieved by the target date of 2015, Germain said.

“By implementing a clear and concrete agenda for women’s and young people’s health and human rights, the next administration can foster a broad global coalition for a more secure, healthy and prosperous world,” she said. “There can be no peace, no human security, without health and human rights for all.”

Germain’s paper, entitled “A New Agenda for Girls’ and Women’s Health and Rights,” calls upon the incoming administration to actively support strong national and intergovernmental commitments on human rights and use its diplomatic and foreign assistance resources to implement them.

The paper asks the administration to “make reproductive health the leading edge of new global health initiatives” to strengthen health systems by focusing on the women’s and children’s health MDGs; raising “flatlined” spending in the field, including funding for UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund; and repealing political restrictions on international family planning, including those that stand in the way of access to safe abortion, such as the Global Gag Rule.

To empower girls and women against HIV/AIDS, the paper recommends elevation of prevention programs, comprehensive sex education and gender-equality guidelines, while involving women locally in campaigns against the pandemic.

“The next U.S. president has not only the opportunity but also the responsibility to ensure that our foreign assistance helps secure the health and human rights of those most in need, namely women and young people,” the paper concludes.

To download a PDF version of "A New Agenda for Girls' and Women's Health and Rights," click here.

To read more ideas and recommendations about what the next U.S. President should do to restore international cooperation, visit www.ondayone.org, a new initiative to encourage participation and discussion about America's role in the world.

For more information about the International Women’s Health Coalition, visit www.iwhc.org

past features