Thanks to Dick Grossman for a link to an editorial by him and Joe Speidel in Contraception, an international journal.

You can access it at: http://www.arhp.org/editorials/December2007.cfm.

MANILA - Twenty Manila women and men filed a case today in a Philippine high court against the mayor of Manila, arguing that the city’s eight-year ban on contraception has severely and irreparably damaged their lives and health and the majority of women in Manila City.

“This ban is yet another abhorrent example of a larger global trend lead by religiously motivated policymakers who adopt policies based on ideology instead of the health and well-being of the very people they are elected to serve,” said Melissa Upreti, senior legal advisor for Asia at the Center for Reproductive Rights. “If elected officials fail to do their duty and meet their human rights obligations, we will ask the courts to do it for them.”

For full article, visit:

http://www.reproductiverights.org/pr_08_0130FilipinoSueManila.html

From the Reproductive and Sexual Health Law Programme.

Congratulations to Nadine Dostrovsky, Rebecca Cook and Michael Gagnon upon the dissemination of their “Annotated Bibliography on Comparative and International Law relating to Forced Marriage,” recently published online on the Canadian Department of Justice website:

A forced marriage occurs when people are coerced into a marriage against their will and under duress, which can include both physical and emotional pressure. A forced marriage is very different from an arranged marriage in which the free and informed consent of both parties is present. Due to its confusion with the tradition of arranged marriage, forced marriage is often associated in developed states with South Asian immigrants, but it is important to remember that it occurs across many cultures and religions.

For full report, visit:

http://canada.justice.gc.ca/en/ps/pad/reports/mar/cover.html

Two of PMC programs were featured in the January/February 2008 edition of Mother Jones magazine, Gugar Goge and Ashreat Al Amal.

Read the article, “As the World Learns.”

A new report from Malawi shows that comprehensive sex education plays an essential role in protecting young people from unintended pregnancy and HIV. The report is based on data from a 2004 nationally representative survey of 4,031 adolescents aged 12-19. Additionally, it draws on findings from 102 in-depth interviews and 11 focus group discussions with adolescents from both urban and rural areas.

For full report, visit:

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/2007/12/10/PNG_Malawi.pdf

In Ethiopia, it can be dangerous for a girl to leave the house. Not because of war, or weather, but “weddings”—specifically the long-standing cultural tradition of marriage by abduction.
Continue Reading »

The JHU INFO Project and WHO is publishing the on-line edition of this 372-page book in stages. The first 13 chapters are available for preview through the links provided on the website. Additional chapters will become available over the next few weeks. Family planning is regaining priority status on health agendas throughout the developing world, driven largely by the unmet needs of millions of women and families.

Published by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Communication Programs’ INFO Project, with support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Family Planning handbook brings together the best available scientific evidence on family planning methods and related topics into one easy-to-use publication.

For full article, visit:

http://www.infoforhealth.org/globalhandbook/

The Muslim world has the world’s highest rate of population growth, and is involved in more armed conflicts (mainly along the interface between the Muslim- and non-Muslim worlds) than any other region of the world. Examples of conflict zones include Lebanon, Albania, Bosnia, Sarajevo, Serbia, Armenia, Bulgaria, Russia, Chechnya, Dagestan, the Caucasus, Pakistan, India, Burma, China, Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, Eritrea/ Ethiopia, Sudan and other northeast African countries, Nigeria, Mauritania, and Algeria.

However before one extrapolates the past into the future one should examine the changes that are taking place in the Muslim world in the area of fertilities, the status of women, and other evidence of slower rates of population growth in the decades to come. Evidence useful for such an examination is given in this document.

For full article, visit:

http://home.alltel.net/bsundquist1/muslim.html

A new World Bank report today warns that poor countries, wealthy donors, and aid agencies are losing sight of the value of contraception, family planning, and other reproductive health programs in helping to boost economic growth, and reduce high birth rates which are strongly linked with endemic poverty, poor education, and high numbers of maternal and infant deaths.

For full article, visit:

http://go.worldbank.org/ZYUER4YUD0

Sex abstinence programmes do not stop risky sexual behaviour or help in the prevention of unwanted pregnancy, a research team has concluded.

BBC News, August 2, 2007 — The Oxford University team reviewed 13 US trials involving over 15,000 people aged 10 to 21.

They found abstinence programmes had no negative or positive impact on the rates of sex infections or unprotected sex, the British Medical Journal said.

Abstinence programmes are popular in the US and have supporters in the UK.

A UK branch of the US Silver Ring Thing was set up four years ago to promote sexual abstinence among young people.

For full article, visit:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6927733.stm