- Comprehensive Sexual and Reproductive Health
- Family Planning
- HIV/AIDS and Other STIs
- Maternal Health
- U.S. Foreign Policy & Funding
- Why Women and Girls?
Comprehensive Sexual and Reproductive Health
CHANGE believes that comprehensive sexual and reproductive health programs and services are the most effective approaches for preventing maternal mortality and morbidity, fighting HIV and AIDS, and meeting the sexual and reproductive health needs of women and young people while also promoting human rights. When reproductive and sexual health programs are segregated from each other, it increases barriers to access and neglects the connections that exist among sexual and reproductive health issues.
CHANGE approaches this question from a woman’s standpoint: what combination of services, programs, and referral systems and what set of rights protections does one need to achieve optimal sexual and reproductive health? If the U.S. government is to help meet the world’s target of achieving universal access to reproductive health by 2015, U.S. policymakers must ask the same question.
See CHANGE's report Reproductive Justice for All: Toward a U.S. Foreign Policy on Comprehensive Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
Raise your voice for the Global Sexual and Reproductive Health Act
Ask your Representative to co-sponsor the Global Sexual and Reproductive Health Act, new legislation that promotes a truly comprehensive and integrated approach to U.S. international reproductive health programs.
Take Action
Take Action on the Global Gag Rule
Join your voice with others and urge your member of Congress to co-sponsor the Global Democracy Promotion Act.
Take Action
Urge your Representative to Co-Sponsor the ICPD Resolution
Urge your member of Congress to support sexual and reproductive health and rights and sustainable development globally by co-sponsoring Rep. Lee's ICPD resolution.
Take Action
- Advocates for Youth
- Americans for UNFPA
- Boston Women’s Health Book Collective
- Center for Development and Population Activities (CEDPA)
- Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR)
- Guttmacher Institute
- International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF)
- International Women’s Health Coalition (IWHC)
- Ipas
- NARAL Pro-Choice America
- Prevention Now!
- Reproductive Health Matters
- Reproductive Health Outlook
- Women’s Global Network for Reproductive Rights (WGNRR)
Source340 million - Each year there are 340 million new cases of curable sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
Source0 - Emergency contraception (EC) is not distributed by USAID.
Source$6.7 billion - Fulfilling the unmet need for modern family planning methods would cost, in total, $6.7 billion annually.
Source50% - Only 50% of women who give birth each year receive antenatal, delivery, and newborn care.
Source20 million - Worldwide, there are over 20 million unsafe abortions every year.
Source215 million - Worldwide, 215 million women who want to avoid a pregnancy are not using an effective method of contraception.
Source35 - In real terms, U.S. support for family planning is at the same level now as it was 35 years ago.
Uganda: Time to Prevent Mothers From Dying Unnecessarily
According to the Uganda Demographic Health Survey Report (UDHS 2006), Ugandan women give birth to an average of seven children, which is the third highest fertility rate in the world. The children are born too early by teenage mothers. By continuing to give birth frequently, our mothers are exposed to high risk pregnancies and births.
Clinical Trials To Go Ahead On Anti-AIDS Vaginal Gel
UNAIDS and the World Health Organization have agreed to hold two further clinical trials on a vaginal gel, which shows promise in reducing the risk of HIV. Experts attending a meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa last week decided new trials should be conducted as quickly as possible to confirm preliminary hopeful results.
SOUTH AFRICA: Communities debate microbicide results
IRIN Plus News, August 23, 2010 -- JOHANNESBURG, The recent release of positive results from a microbicide trial in South Africa have kick-started discussions between scientists, activists and community workers about the quickest and most responsible way of getting a product into women's hands.
ETHIOPIA: Tackling the perils of pregnancy
Childbirth will prove fatal for one in 27 women in Ethiopia and much of the rest of the continent, according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), versus a rate of one in 8,000 in industrialized countries
Hillary Clinton Touts Global Health Initiative as Key Foreign Policy Tool
"What exactly does maternal health or immunizations or the fight against HIV and AIDS have to do with foreign policy?" Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton queried a packed crowd of faculty and students at the Johns Hopkins School of Advance International Studies on Monday. "Well, my answer is 'everything.' "
SWAZILAND: ABC approach to be shelved
"If you look at the increase of HIV in the country while we've been applying the ABC concept all these years, then it is evident that ABC is not the answer," said Dr Derek von Wissell, Director of the National Emergency Response Council on HIV/AIDS (NERCHA).
KENYA: HIV prevention for sex workers by sex workers
IRIN Plus News, August 11, 2010 -- NAIROBI - By night, Viviane Muasi, 25, is a sex worker in Kenya's capital, Nairobi, but when not canvassing for clients, she spends much of her time convincing other sex workers to test for HIV and use condoms.
Ethiopia: U.S. foreign policy and unsafe abortion in Africa
United States foreign policy abortion restrictions have often hampered African NGOs’ efforts to reduce deaths and disabilities associated with unsafe abortion procedures. In a positive recent development, however, the fight for African women’s access to safe abortion services took a small but important step forward.
A Framework for Comprehensive Approaches to Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, Including HIV
This poster, developed for the 2010 XVIII International AIDS Conference, illustrates a user-based framework for comprehensive sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) to facilitate optimum sexual and reproductive health.
Download this PDF
File Under: Research Documents
Fact Sheet: Global Sexual and Reproductive Health Act
The Global Sexual and Reproductive Health Act (H.R. 5121) establishes U.S. policy and authorizes assistance to support universal access to sexual and reproductive health care in developing countries, including contraception and safe abortion.
Download this PDFFile Under: Fact Sheets
Fact Sheet: Global Democracy Promotion Act of 2010
The Global Democracy Promotion Act of 2010 provides that the U.S. Foreign Assistance Act cannot impose eligibility restrictions on international recipients of U.S. aid that would be illegal if imposed nationally. Would constitute a legislative repeal of the Mexico City Policy, also called the Global Gag Rule.
Download this PDFFile Under: Fact Sheets
Investing in Reproductive Justice for All
Based on international field visits, this report establishes an innovative framework to assess sexual and reproductive health programs.
Download this PDFFile Under: Research Documents
Investing in Reproductive Justice for All: Executive Summary
Based on international field visits, this report establishes a groundbreaking framework to assess sexual and reproductive health programs.
Download this PDFFile Under: Research Documents
Action Steps for the Health and Rights of Women and Youth
Promoting the sexual and reproductive health and rights of all people is integral to alleviating poverty, promoting security and building more stable nations – central tenets of U.S. foreign policy and goals of U.S. foreign assistance.
Download this PDFFile Under: Policy Briefs
The Case for Comprehensive: Dominican Republic
Rising HIV prevalence for young women and high rates of teen pregnancy are strong indicators of the gaps in the Dominican Republic’s sexual and reproductive health care. Moreover, despite the fact that almost all births are attended by skilled providers, maternal mortality is alarmingly high.
Download this PDFFile Under: Country Profiles
The Case for Comprehensive: Botswana
Botswana appears to be a series of contradictions. Although economically better off than its neighbors, with relatively good roads, solid communications network, and 24-hour hospitals fairly well distributed throughout the country, Botswana nevertheless has serious barriers to comprehensive sexual and reproductive health care.
Download this PDFFile Under: Country Profiles
Comprehensive Sexual and Reproductive Health Topics
Components and Attributes
There are three essential components of sexual and reproductive health care: family planning, sexual health, and maternal health.
Comprehensive Services in Low-Resource Settings
The Family Guidance Association of Ethiopia (FGAE) attempts to fill the gaps in Ethiopia’s health infrastructure by training and deploying community-based reproductive health agents.
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