International Family Planning Perspectives articles from March 2003

International Family Planning Perspectives archives from March 2003

Cairo agreement stands, despite U.S. opposition. (Update).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... At a conference held in Bangkok in December 2002 to develop ways to implement the program of action adopted in Cairo at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, Asian and European delegations overwhelmingly rejected U.S....

Half of all adults with HIV are women. (Update).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Half of the world's 39 million adults with HIV/AIDS are women, according to a report of the latest data on the epidemic. (1) Women also made up half of the 2.5 million adults who died of AIDS in 2002 and half of the 4.2 million adults who were...

Lowered fertility speeds economic growth. (Update).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Since 1970, developing nations with lower fertility and slower population expansion have achieved faster economic growth, according to the United Nations Population Fund (UNEPA). (1) In Brazil, for exam pie, declining fertility led to decreased...

Mortality from induced abortion in West Africa. (Update).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Complications of induced abortion account for nearly one-third of all maternal deaths in West Africa, according to a study conducted in 12 hospitals in Benin, Cote d'Ivoire and Senegal between May and October 1999. (1) During that period, 4,116...

Afghan women lack basic rights. (Update).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Lack of access to basic human needs and rights may be a major factor in Afghanistan's high maternal mortality. (1) Data from Herat Province, where an estimated 593 women die for every 100,000 births, show that many women do not have sufficient...

Arab men are unlikely to use male methods. (Update).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Men in the United Arab Emirates do not commonly use male contraceptive methods and show only moderate levels of contraceptive knowledge, according to a cross-sectional survey conducted among randomly selected monogamously married fathers...

HIV prevalence in South Africa. (Update).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... Eleven percent of the South African population older than two are infected with HIV, according to the country's first nationally representative study of HIV prevalence and sexual behavior. (1) Researchers used results of saliva-based tests to...

Only about one-half of births in developing countries involve a skilled attendant, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). (In Brief).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... * Only about one-half of births in developing countries involve a skilled attendant, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Sub-Saharan Africa had the lowest proportion of such deliveries in 2000-42%, which was just 5% higher than...

Seven women and 11 men were elected as judges on the International Criminal Court. (In Brief).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... * Seven women and 11 men were elected as judges on the International Criminal Court on Feb. 7,2003; 10 of the 43 candidates were women. The Women's Caucus for Gender Justice, which had lobbied for "fair representation" of female and male...

China is now producing three drugs that can be used in combination to treat AIDS. (In Brief).(Brief Article)
March 1, 2003... * China is now producing three drugs that can be used in combination to treat AIDS. The State Drug Administration has granted permission to Shanghai Desano Biopharmaceuticals Company to manufacture the "cocktail"--didanosine, stavudine and...

Relationships between contraception and abortion: A review of the evidence. (Articles).
March 1, 2003... CONTEXT: The relationship between levels of contraceptive use and the incidence of induced abortion continues to provoke heated discussion, with some observers arguing that use of abortion decreases as contraceptive prevalence rises and others...

Correction.(Calendar)
March 1, 2003... In "Reproductive Choices for Asian Adolescents: A Focus on Contraceptive Behavior," by Saroj Pachauri and K.G. Santhya [2002, 28(4):186-195], the bar chart shown in Figure 2 (p. 187) is incorrect. The corrected figure is shown below, and can be...

Reproductive health risk and protective factors among unmarried youth in Ghana. (Articles).
March 1, 2003... CONTEXT: In Ghana, as in many other Sub-Saharan African countries, the behaviors of the current cohort of adolescents will strongly influence the course of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This study sought to identify factors associated with elevated...

Can women's childbearing and contraceptive intentions predict contraceptive demand? Findings from a longitudinal study in central India. (Article).
March 1, 2003... CONTEXT: To predict the need for contraceptive services, family planning program managers often rely on levels of unmet need derived from measures of childbearing intentions. However, women's intention to use a method has not received as much...

Sexual health experiences of adolescents in three Ghanaian towns.
March 1, 2003... CONTEXT: Ghanaian youth are greatly affected by widespread social change, and their reproductive health needs may differ by social group, age and gender. METHODS: In-person interviews on sexual health issues were conducted with 704...

Condom use and the accuracy of AIDS knowledge in Cote d'Ivoire. (Articles).
March 1, 2003... CONTEXT: Condom use remains low in Cote d'Ivoire, despite an increasing prevalence of HIV and widespread awareness of how the virus is transmitted. Information is needed about characteristics that predict condom use and about the role of AIDS...

Syndromic diagnosis of reproductive tract infections leads to substantial unnecessary treatment in Vietnam. (Digests).
March 1, 2003... Current strategies to diagnose reproductive tract infections (RTIs) in resource-poor settings by relying on presumptive diagnoses may be leading to considerable overdiagnosis and overtreatment. According to a study of 600 clinic users in Hue,...

Although abortion is highly restricted in Cameroon, it is not uncommon among young urban women. (Digests).
March 1, 2003... In Cameroon, where abortion may be performed legally only in cases of medical necessity or rape, a high proportion of young urban women have had at least one abortion. (1) One in five 20-29-year-old women surveyed in Yaounde in 1997 said that...

Bangladeshi women weigh a variety of factors when choosing a contraceptive. (Digests).
March 1, 2003... Bangladeshi women's choice of a contraceptive is influenced not only by their personal characteristics but also by their assessments of available options. For example, pill users choose their method, among other reasons, because of its...

Genital cutting may alter, rather than eliminate, women's sexual sensations. (Digests).
March 1, 2003... Nigerian women who have undergone female genital cutting are as likely as those who have not to achieve orgasm during sexual intercourse, but are significantly more likely to have recurrent symptoms of reproductive tract infection. In a study...

Offering a woman sterilization during an emergency cesarean section may sometimes be appropriate. (Digests).
March 1, 2003... High-parity Zimbabwean women who accepted surgical contraception during an emergency cesarean section were no more likely to regret having done so than similar women who underwent the procedure during an elective cesarean (2.5% vs. 3.20/0)....