UN Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs,
with support from the UN Population Fund (UNFPA)
|
| UN Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, with support from the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) |
|
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This newsletter is being made available by the Population Information
Network (POPIN) of the United Nations Population Division (DESIPA), in
collaboration with Population Communication International. For further
information please contact Patrice_Newman@together.org
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INTERNATIONAL DATELINE
A Population and Development News and Information Service
DECEMBER WORLD POPULATION UPDATE:
5,738,200,000 (Population
Reference Bureau)
DECEMBER 1995
THE UNITED NATIONS HAS RELEASED TWO 1994 UPDATES OF
POPULATION PROJECTIONS--one focusing on world population trends and
the other charting patterns of urbanization around the world. World
Population Prospects 1994 contains the latest revisions of population
estimates and projections for the world, more- and less-developed
regions, least developed countries, major areas and individual
countries. What the U.N. calls "the projection horizon" was
extended to the year 2050 in the research, so for the first time an
entire century of demographic history and projections are available--
from 1950 to 2050. World Urbanization Prospects: The 1994 Revision--
at 178 pages a much smaller tome than the 885-page world population
report--presents estimates and projections on the size and growth of
both urban and rural populations in all countries of the world. The
report ranks the world's top 15 cities and the mega-cities with 8
million or more inhabitants; analyzes the phenomenon of counter-
urbanization; describes the distribution of cities and populations;
and presents current levels of urbanization and future trends for
urban and rural populations of the world, the less- and more-
developed regions and individual countries.
THE CURRENT WORLD POPULATION GROWTH RATE IS THE LOWEST
RECORDED SINCE THE SECOND WORLD WAR, according to World Population
Prospects. At mid-1994, world population stood at 5.6 billion,
having grown by about 86 million in the year before that--an average
of 236,000 people per day, or 1.57 percent per year. Of the world's
5.6 billion people, an estimated 4.5 billion--or 79 percent of the
total world population--live in our planet's less developed regions.
Despite the current slower population growth rates, the U.N. says in
its medium-range population projection that world population could
grow to 7.5 billion by 2015 and 9.8 billion by 2050. According to
the revisions, the 1994 top ten countries in population size are:
China with 1.2 billion people; India with 919 million; the United
States with 261 million; Indonesia with 195 million; Brazil with 159
million; the Russian Federation with 147 million; Pakistan with 137
million; Japan with 125 million; Bangladesh with 118 million, and
Nigeria with 108 million. These top ten countries are also the only
ones in the world whose populations exceed 100 million.
JUST 23 OF THE WORLD'S 228 COUNTRIES ARE HOME TO 75 PERCENT
OF THE WORLD'S CITIZENS. Besides the top ten countries with
populations of 100 million or more, thirteen countries have a
population size between 50 million and 100 million, accounting for
15 percent of the world's total humanity. In this group, there are
five countries in Asia (Vietnam, the Philippines, Iran, Turkey and
Thailand), five in Europe (Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Italy
and Ukraine), two in Africa (Egypt and Ethiopia) and one in Latin
America and the Caribbean (Mexico). China and India alone account
for 38 percent of the entire world population.
BY THE YEAR 2050, THE RANKING OF COUNTRIES BY POPULATION SIZE
WILL BE SUBSTANTIALLY CHANGED, according to U.N. projections, mostly
due to wide differences in national population growth rates. India
is projected to surpass China by 2050, becoming the largest country
in the world with a population of 1.64 billion. But China will be
only slightly behind with a projected population size of 1.6 billion.
Pakistan will probably be the world's third-largest country by 2050,
with a population of 381 million--over two and a half times its
current size. The United States is projected to rank fourth in that
year--with a population of 349 million. And Nigeria will most likely
step into the fifth position by 2050 with a population of around 339
million--more than trebling its current size of 108 million.
WHILE WORLD POPULATION TRENDS ARE PROJECTED TO A YEAR 2050
HORIZON, U.N. URBANIZATION ESTIMATES ONLY EXTEND TO THE YEARS 2015
and 2025. According to World Urbanization Prospects 1994, the top
fifteen "urban agglomerations" are currently: Tokyo (26.5 million
people); New York (16.3 million); Sao Paulo (16.1 million); Mexico
City (15.5 million); Shanghai (14.7 million); Bombay (14.5 million);
Los Angeles (12.2 million); Beijing (12.0 million); Calcutta (11.5
million); Seoul (11.5 million); Jakarta (11.0 million); Buenos Aires
(10.9 million); Osaka (10.6 million); Tianjin (10.4 million), and Rio
de Janeiro (9.8 million). By the year 2000, Lagos (Nigeria), Karachi
(Pakistan) and Delhi (India) are expected to join the list, replacing
Rio de Janeiro, Osaka and Buenos Aires. By 2010, Dhaka (Bangladesh)
will replace Seoul as one of the world's fifteen largest urban areas.
And by 2015, metro Manila will have joined the list with a population
of 14.7 million.
IN 1950, AN URBAN POPULATION OF ONLY 3.3 MILLION GOT YOU ONTO
THE TOP FIFTEEN CITIES LIST. BUT BY 1994, 9.8 MILLION PEOPLE WERE
REQUIRED to compete in the city big leagues. And by 2015, the U.N.
Population Division says, 14.7 million people will be the threshold
for being one of the world's largest fifteen cities. There is also
a significant shift in the representation of more- and less-developed
regions on the big cities list. In 1950, all but three of the top
fifteen cities were located in more-developed regions. By 2015, only
two--Tokyo and New York--will remain. Asian cities will dominate the
list with eleven out of the fifteen spots. The remaining positions
will be taken by two cities in Latin America and the Caribbean (Sao
Paulo and Mexico City) and one African city: Lagos is projected to
be ranked third by 2015 and New York will likely be down in the 11th
spot.
THE NUMBER OF MEGA-CITIES--DEFINED BY THE U.N. AS HAVING 8
MILLION OR MORE PEOPLE--IS INCREASING RAPIDLY, particularly in less-
developed regions. In 1950, only two cities fell into the "mega"
category--London and New York. By mid-1994, 22 cities around the
world had populations of at least 8 million, and 16 of those are
located in less-developed regions. Asia has 12 mega-cities (Tokyo,
Shanghai, Bombay, Beijing, Calcutta, Seoul, Osaka, Tianjin, Jakarta,
Delhi, Metro Manila, and Karachi); Latin America and the Caribbean
hold four (Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro),
and Africa hosts two (Lagos and Cairo). By 2015, 33 mega-cities are
expected to exist around the world, with 27 of those--almost 82
percent--in the less developed regions. Two cities will be new to
the mega-cities list in 2015: Lima, Peru and Kinshasha, Zaire. And
from now to 2015, Paris and Moscow will remain the only mega-cities
in Europe.
WORLD POPULATION PROSPECTS 1994 ALSO ASSESSES THREE NEW
DEMOGRAPHIC SITUATIONS IN THE WORLD: recent fertility declines in
Africa and Asia; demographics in countries with economies in
transition, and the demographic impact of H.I.V and AIDS. The report
says that fertility in Africa currently averages 5.8 children per
woman--0.2 child below the figure projected two years ago. And in
a number of African and Asian countries where fertility levels have
been high and constant for decades, the U.N. says, new demographic
surveys or censuses disclosed recent fertility declines. The U.N.
says that sub-Saharan Africa "no longer presents a picture of
monolithically high and unchanging fertility levels." The report
also notes that new data indicate that Bangladesh and Iran are
undergoing a rapid fertility transition. Regarding the demography
of the 27 European countries undertaking a transition from a
centrally planned to a market economy, the U.N. says the changes have
been striking. Many of the countries are showing net losses of
population--due to low fertility levels, out-migration of residents,
and a stagnating or rising incidence of mortality. Within Eastern
Europe, population has declined since 1990 in Belarus, Bulgaria, the
Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, the Russian Federation and Ukraine.
Elsewhere in Europe, negative growth rates are occurring in Bosnia
and Herzegovina, Croatia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
THE DEMOGRAPHIC IMPACT OF H.I.V. AND AIDS IS ASSESSED BY THE
U.N. FOR 15 COUNTRIES IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA AND THAILAND. These
sixteen countries are the only ones around the world where more than
1 percent of the adult population--age 15 and over--is infected with
HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Below that level, the U.N. says,
the impact of AIDS on national demographic profiles is negligible.
The fifteen sub-Saharan countries are: Benin; Burkina Faso; Burundi;
Central African Republic; Congo; C“te d'Ivoire; Kenya; Malawi;
Mozambique; Rwanda; Uganda; United Republic of Tanzania; Zaire;
Zambia, and Zimbabwe. Three of the countries--Uganda, Zambia and
Zimbabwe--have levels of HIV infection that topped 8 percent in 1992.
The AIDS epidemic affects population growth in two ways, according
to the U.N. First, in the number of deaths from AIDS-related causes
and second through the reduced number of births that occur because
fewer women survive into and through their child-bearing years. In
Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe, AIDS has already reduced the total
population (43 million) by two percent (747,000). And by 2005, there
will be 6.5 percent (4 million) fewer citizens in those three African
countries than were once forecast to live there. In the 15 sub-
Saharan African countries as a whole, the cumulative impact of deaths
from AIDS is currently about one percent (2 million) and will reach
four percent (12 million) by 2005. Without the epidemic, the
countries' population size would currently be 223 million, projected
to grow to 304 million by 2005. Life expectancy has dropped
significantly in some of these countries. Kenya, Uganda, and Zambia
have lost five or more years on their average life expectancies due
to AIDS while Zimbabwe has lost seven.
DESPITE THE DEVASTATING TOLL OF THE AIDS EPIDEMIC, THE U.N.
PROJECTS THAT POPULATION GROWTH WILL CONTINUE TO SWELL in Africa,
with high fertility rates the main driver of growth. For the period
from 1980 to 2005, population in the 15-country aggregate with over
one percent HIV-infection will more than double from 138 million to
292 million. Even Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe--with over eight
percent HIV infection of the adult population--will see their
populations double in the same period. Individually, ten of the 15
countries will double in population size: Burundi; Congo; C“te
d'Ivoire; Kenya; Malawi; Rwanda; Uganda; Tanzania; Zaire, and Zambia.
Percentage increases are projected to be as high as 140 percent in
C“te d'Ivoire, 127 percent in Kenya and 120 percent in Zaire.
THE HIGHEST RATES OF HIV INFECTION IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA ARE
AMONG MEN AND WOMEN OF REPRODUCTIVE AGE with women infected as
frequently as men. Children born of HIV-positive mothers are at
great risk of both contracting the disease and becoming orphans early
in life, and the U.N. report examines this aspect of HIV/AIDS.
Because of Africa's high mortality rates, a large number of children
would be orphans even without the AIDS epidemic, the U.N. points out.
But in 1990, there were almost 12 percent more orphans because of
AIDS. By 2005, the number of orphans will be almost double that
projected in the absence of AIDS. Kenya, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe
will be especially hard hit. In 2005, Zimbabwe will have 217,000
children under age 10 who have lost their mothers to AIDS--an
astounding 271 percent more than projected without the disease. In
absolute numbers, Uganda will be the hardest hit. Almost 600,000
orphans are projected in that country by 2005--over half of these
losing their parents to an AIDS-related illness.
United Nations publications are sold through bookstores and
distributors throughout the world. For more information contact:
United Nations, Sales Section, New York, NY 10017 USA.
(World Population Prospects: The 1994 Revision, 1995, United
Nations, New York; World Urbanization Prospects: The 1994
Revision, 1995, United Nations, New York)
* * * * *
CERVICAL CANCER IS CAUSED BY A SEXUALLY-TRANSMITTED VIRUS,
says Xavier Bosch, a Spanish epidemiologist carrying out research for
the International Cancer Research Institute, a division of the World
Health Organization. Cervical cancer is the leading cause of cancer
fatalities among women in the developing world, and the second
leading cause of cancer death in the developed world. The disease
develops in a still undetermined percentage of women infected by the
papilloma virus after a period of 15-20 years. Currently, the only
way to detect the disease is through the Pap smear, which can screen
for early detection of precancerous lesions.
MORE THAN 500,000 NEW CASES OF CERVICAL CANCER ARE REPORTED
YEARLY--EIGHT PERCENT OF THESE IN THE DEVELOPING WORLD, according to
Bosch. The virus is transmitted through unprotected sexual contact.
Often the infection does not present any symptoms and many women
simply recover. But in a certain percentage of women, the infection
becomes chronic and develops into cervical cancer. It is estimated
that between five and ten percent of the population carries the
virus. To test the relationship between unprotected sex and the
incidence of cervical cancer, a study compared the average number of
sexual partners in Spain and Colombia. According to Bosch, Colombian
men and women have more than twice the number of sexual partners as
their Spanish counterparts. The incidence of the disease reflects
the different levels of unprotected sexual activity: in Spain, 4.7%
of the female population is infected with the papilloma virus, while
in Colombia, the percentage is 13.3%.
(El Pais, international edition, 28 August 1995, Barcelona,
Spain)
* * * * *
THE ARGENTINE GOVERNMENT--PRUDISH AND APPARENTLY INTIMIDATED
BY THE CATHOLIC CHURCH--is seeing its young people die rather than
permit the word "condom" to be used in its anti-AIDS campaign. Among
South American nations, only Brazil registers a higher rate of AIDS
than Argentina: 39 cases for every million people against Brazil's
73 persons per million. Officially, cases since 1982 totaled some
5300, but because of under-reporting, the actual figure is probably
closer to 12,000. And it is estimated that within five years, the
figure will more than double to 25,000. Appalled and frustrated by
the statistics and the death of friends and relatives, high school
students have taken matters into their own hands by wielding spray
cans to paint graffiti throughout Buenos Aires reading: "AIDS: For
Love, Use a Condom." Sixteen-year-old Concepcion Mateo was arrested
while painting the slogan on a building but released, she says,
"after I cried and told them that my brother (who died of AIDS) would
be alive today if he had used a condom."
THE BUENOS AIRES GOVERNMENT MUST SHARE THE BLAME for the
situation, according to non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working
against the disease. They charge that the national campaign focuses
on AIDS transmission while censoring out any mention of the
preventive role condoms can play. Linda Sassoon, coordinator of the
privately-financed Huesped Foundation, which provides AIDS
counseling, says: "the government has surrendered to Argentina's
politically powerful Catholic bishops, who have branded users of
condoms as degenerates." And Dr. Laura Astarloa, in charge of the
national AIDS program, says candidly: "The government does not want
to lock horns with the Church." But Rev. Juan Ronconi, the
Argentinian Catholic Church's point man on AIDS, insists that the
Church is a scapegoat for the government's failure to adequately
finance AIDS prevention and care. Dr. Astarloa admits she has to
fight to persuade the government to increase funding from last year's
US$13 million to the current $20 million--a sum, she says, that will
not go very far.
(New York Times, 19 January 1995, New York)
* * * * *
THE INFLUENCE OF FAMILY-PLANNING MESSAGES CARRIED THROUGH THE
MASS MEDIA APPARENTLY HAS SIGNIFICANT EFFECTS on reproductive
behavior. According to analyses from the 1989 Kenya Demographic and
Health Survey, there is a "strong statistical association" between
women who have heard or seen media messages on family planning and
their reproductive preferences and use of contraceptives. While
cautioning that their findings are based on "anecdotal evidence" and
"some evaluation surveys," the researchers make these observations:
* Some 15 percent of women who have neither seen nor heard media
messages on family planning use a contraceptive method;
* The proportion rises to 25 percent among women who have heard
radio messages;
* The figure is 40 percent among women exposed to both radio and
print messages;
* And it rises to 50 percent among those exposed to radio, print
and television.
Based on the same observations, the researchers concluded that in
preference expressed for family size:
* Women exposed to no media messages on the subject reported an
average of 5 children as their ideal.
* Those exposed to all three media types preferred an average of
4.7 children.
THOUGH IT FOCUSED ON KENYA, THE STUDY DREW SIMILAR LESSONS
from evaluations taken in Egypt and Iran. Concluding, the
researchers said: "In the light of anecdotal and other evidence from
Kenya and elsewhere, we believe that the mass media can have an
important effect on reproductive behavior."
(International Family Planning Perspectives, March 1995, The
Alan Guttmacher Institute, New York)
* * * * *
A PUBLICATION THAT FOCUSES ON DEVELOPMENT IN SOUTHERN AFRICA
HAS TURNED ITS SPOTLIGHT on the critical shortage of housing that
plagues the Republic of South Africa. The periodical is published
by the Human Sciences Research Council's Program for Development
Research Council (PRODDER). In dedicating an entire 56-page issue
to housing, the editor of the council's newsletter, David Barnard,
explains: "This issue focuses on various issues and initiatives
relating to housing in South Africa, as well as to the experiences
of the rest of southern Africa and abroad." To illustrate the
magnitude of the challenge, he points out that there are as many as
8 million homeless in South Africa, a shortage of 1.3 million new
houses and a need for another 130,000 new units every year. In a
program aimed at catching up with the deficit, the Government of
National Unity has committed itself to ensure that 1 million houses
are built over the next five years.
THE PRODDER PUBLICATION COVERS CHAPTERS ON A VARIETY OF
ORGANIZATIONS dedicated to coping with the region's housing problems.
They include the National Housing Forum, Housing Consumer Protection
Trust and Urban Sector Network--all based in South Africa. Contents
also deal with such housing-related projects as university courses
and programs, international conferences, current research, trade
fairs and exhibitions, and a dozen pages of new publications and
video tapes on housing. Copies of PRODDER Newsletter: The Southern
Africa Development Directory, are available from PRODDER, HSRC, P.O.
Box 324l0, Braamfont, 20l7, South Africa.
* * * * *
AN ACTION PLAN TO COMBAT AND EVENTUALLY ELIMINATE FEMALE
GENITAL MUTILATION is being developed by the World Health
Organization (WHO). The project results from recommendations made
at an international Geneva meeting of women's health advocates, non-
governmental organizations, researchers, nurses, midwives,
physicians, and United Nations agencies, including the U.N.
Population Fund (UNFPA). The meeting's purpose was to define and
study all aspects of the traditional practice that mutilates as many
as 115 million girls and women every year. In the short term,
effects of female genital mutilation include hemorrhage, shock and
infection--all of which may cause death. Longer-term effects include
urinary-tract infections, chronic pelvic inflammatory diseases,
infertility, psycho-effective and sexual dysfunction, and obstructed
labor--which is a major cause of maternal mortality.
Recommendations--upon which the WHO action plan will be based--
include:
* Greater advocacy at all levels for eliminating female genital
mutilation.
* Training programs for health workers, community leaders, women's
groups and researchers.
* Strengthened partnership between health and human rights
advocates and between researchers, policy-makers, women's health and
rights groups, and those working to eliminate female genital
mutilation.
THE GENEVA CONFERENCE ALSO AGREED ON A DEFINITION OF THE
PRACTICE, to more accurately describe and measure the prevalence of
female genital mutilation worldwide. By agreed definition, female
genital mutilation comprises "all procedures which involve partial
or total removal of the external female genitalia and/or other injury
to the female genital organs, whether for cultural or any other non-
therapeutic reasons."
(WHO Features, August 1995, World Health Organization,
Geneva, Switzerland)
* * * * *
IT WASN'T THE FIRST TIME, BUT CHINA'S DECISION TO PROHIBIT
DOGS ON ITS TERRITORY EFFECTIVE JULY 31 OF THIS YEAR sent shudders
down the spines of many a pet owner. Nevertheless, the government,
citing a burgeoning canine population that is a major environmental
burden, defended the measure. China's capital, Beijing, has almost
200,000 dogs, and nationwide, there are over 100,000,000--about one
dog for every 11 persons. The dogs eat up 15 tons of food per year,
enough to feed 40 million Chinese. While a human being consumes the
equivalent of half a kilo of cereal per day, dogs eat more than
double that. It is estimated that 7% of the country's grain
production goes "to the dogs." The government attempted the ban in
1994, but it was difficult to impose the rule in the Year of the Dog.
THE PROHIBITION DOES ALLOW FOR SOME EXEMPTIONS: any dog
measuring under 36 cm (14 inches) is allowed, as well as all
Pekinese, a species long accorded almost reverential status in China.
Those whose dogs meet the requirements must shell out US$460 a year,
approximately triple the wages of an employee working in a large
city, in exchange for a medallion tag for the pet and an embossed
registration certificate. For many, the only solution is having the
dog shipped out of the country or killed. "We are going to be very
strict with this new law," says Cho Wong Pu, head of the Dog
Propaganda Unit in Beijing. "We have a duty to protect people and
maintain social order and to clean up the environment. This law is
deeply welcomed by the masses."
(La Vanguardia, Horacio S enz Guerrero, Barcelona, July 30,
1995, and BBC World News, report by Humphrey Hawksley,
August 1995)
* * * * *
NGO SUPPLEMENT December 1995
For and About NGOs and their Work
WHAT ARE POPULARLY CALLED 'MORNING-AFTER PILLS' WERE THE
FOCUS OF AN INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION that drew 24 experts from around
the world to the Rockefeller Center in Bellagio, Italy earlier this
year. Technically designated "emergency contraception," the
technique comprises a growing array of post-coital methods that
advocates say could spare millions of mostly-young women worldwide
from the anxiety, pain and threat-to-life of unwanted pregnancies.
Drawing on clinical, statistical and anecdotal experiences, the
experts drafted and adopted an agreed statement and recommendations
aimed at spreading knowledge of emergency contraception. The
conclusion was that emergency contraception is not as widely known
as it deserves to be, partly because of ignorance of its existence
or availability and partly because of active resistance based on
misconceptions about the method. With support from the Rockefeller
Foundation, the four-day Bellagio meeting was co-sponsored by the
International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), the South-to-
South Cooperation in Reproductive Health, Family Health
International, the Population Council, and the World Health
Organization (WHO). Several articles about to emergency
contraception were featured in a recent issue of Planned Parenthood
In Europe under the general heading: "Expanding Access to Emergency
Contraception in Developing Countries."
IN AN EDITORIAL, IPPF CONSULTANT EVERT KETTING EXPRESSED
SURPRISE at the general ignorance about emergency contraception.
Ketting, deputy director of the Netherlands Institute of Social
Sexological Research, said the methods had been common knowledge in
his country for some 30 years. Yet in most countries, he said, even
service providers or women who could benefit by them know little or
nothing about the contraceptive methods for use in such emergencies
as condom slippage, for example. He blamed the situation in part on
false beliefs--including the "inexhaustible idea" that if emergency
contraception were easily obtainable, young people would engage more
irresponsibly in sex. Ketting cited that canard as an old fallacy
in which people can supposedly be encouraged to act responsibly by
lack of access to essential information and services. He explained
that the Bellagio conference was prompted by the urgency of
accelerating research for emergency contraceptives more effective
than the two most commonly used methods: a combination of ordinary
birth control pills and the post-coital insertion of an IUD. Ketting
strongly discouraged the suggestion that "morning-after pills" could
be used routinely instead of conventional contraceptives. "After
all," he concluded, "an emergency solution is only for emergency
cases." In a statement on emergency contraception, the IPPF's
International Medical Advisory Panel defined some of the
circumstances that justify resorting to emergency contraception.
Broadly, they said, they should be used by women exposed to
unprotected sexual intercourse, specifically condom breakage, missed
pills or in the case of rape.
CONTRARY TO ANOTHER MISCONCEPTION, EMERGENCY CONTRACEPTION
IS NOT ABORTION, Ketting emphasized in a separate article. It is
therefore permissible even in countries where abortion is illegal,
he says. This point was also stressed at the Bellagio meeting. At
the conference, WHO provided a comprehensive review of the scientific
literature on emergency contraception, including evidence that the
Yazpe method (two regular contraceptive pills taken within 72 hours
of unprotected intercourse) and the IUD (insertion within 5 days
after unprotected intercourse) are both methods safe and relatively
reliable. The Bellagio conference agreed that both regimens are
effec ive, safe, convenient to use and easily accessible.
Nevertheless, attenders recommended further research to improve
existing methods and to develop new and better ones. WHO research
suggests that Mifepristone (RU 486) is potentially a very effective
emergency contraceptive method, with few side effects.
(Planned Parenthood in Europe, August 1995, International
Planned Parenthood Federation, London)
* * * * *
A NEW AND UNORTHODOX INTERNATIONAL PROJECT HAS BEEN LAUNCHED
by six family planning associations (FPAs) in Africa, Asia and the
Caribbean. Under the umbrella of the International Planned
Parenthood Federation's (IPPF) Sexual Health Project, the undertaking
is designed to improve sexual health at the community level. Strong
grass-roots input is solicited to sensitize the FPA staff and
volunteers to better understand the needs and concerns of the people
they serve. Carried out through community discussions, the approach
adds a new dimension to traditional programs, which often slight
community views. The programs in which the teachers learn from their
pupils is being tested in Burkina Faso, Dominican Republic, Gambia,
Ghana, India and Tanzania. As IPPF explains: "The Sexual Health
Program is creating the opportunity for people in marginalized
villages and neighborhoods to take independent, community action to
change their lives for the better."
SEXUAL HEALTH BEGINS WITH THE INDIVIDUAL, but goes on to
spread its benefits to the community, says Hilary Hughes, IPPF
adviser on the new project. In an article elaborating on the
subject, he explains that the term "sexual health" goes beyond such
physical considerations as pregnancy, childbirth and sexually
transmitted diseases. It also includes the emotional relationships
"which allow us to develop as full human beings." Hughes calls
sexual health "a basic human right" which guarantees an individual
the ability to exercise control over his or her sex life. He
suggests that "preaching" rarely has the impact of the participatory
approach to sexual health because options for improving their own
lives may be entail factors beyond people's control--such as poverty
or lack of power. He concludes that to move forward, individuals and
communities must be encouraged to express their needs--the approach
taken by the IPPF's new participatory program.
For further information and copies of the paper Participatory
Operations Research and Sexual Health, write to Sexual Health
Project, International Planned Parenthood Federation, Regent's
College, Inner Circle, Regent's Park, London NW1 4NS, England.
(Press Release, January 1995, IPPF, London and Health
Action, September/November 1994, AHRTAG, London)
* * * * *