Insights & Updates – Page 13 – Global Reproductive Health at Duke

Effects of COVID-19 on Sexual Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) among Young People in Africa

April 26, 2020December 10, 2024 by Aarushi Venkatakrishnan3 Comments

By: Sandra Y. Oketch Mid-April, I was privileged to join the Live webcast on discussions around the Effects of COVID-19 on Sexual Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) among young people in Africa. The panelists included experts in the medical, advocacy, and policy fields: Dr. Charlene Biwott (KEMRI, Kenya), Millicent Sethaile (Her Voice Ambassador, Botswana), and Levi Singh (Youth SRHR Strategy Officer, South Africa). The moderator was Evelyne Odhiambo (AfNHi Youth Cohort, Kenya). Important to note were conversations around the vulnerability of young people during this pandemic where the younger populations have so far been the least vulnerable to complications and death from COVID-19 and yet play a very key role in flattening the COVID-19 curve by minimizing transmissions to the vulnerable populations in our society that include the immune-compromised and the elderly. Currently, there has been a great shift of focus in Africa to cater to the COVID-19 pandemic thereby impacting negatively in other areas including SRHR. Some of the effects on...

COVID-19 and Gender

April 26, 2020December 10, 2024 by Emily WoodrowNo Comments

During the current COVID-19 pandemic, it is important to view aspects of how the virus and its crisis affect men and women differently across the world and specifically in the United States (COVID-19: A Gender Lens). It seems that in areas where thousands have been diagnosed with COVID-19, more men appear to be infected and dying than women—although the biologic reasons behind these observations are not yet fully clear. A news article published on April 7, 2020, figures reported from New York City’s Health Department show “there have been nearly 43 Covid-19 deaths for every 100,000 men in the city, compared with 23 such deaths for every 100,000 women” (Rabin). According to the article “The gendered dimensions of COVID-19” in The LANCET, an organization called Global Health 50/50 tracks sex-disaggregated infection and mortality COVID-19 data from 39 countries (The Lancet). This data from Global Health 50/50 shows more men are dying from COVID-19 and finds that particularly threatening outcomes of the...

Feature Collaboration: Kenya Medical Education Trust (KMET)

April 26, 2020December 10, 2024 by Aarushi VenkatakrishnanNo Comments

By: Sandra Y. Oketch The Kenya Medical Education Finance Trust (KMET) is a non-governmental organization founded in 1995 with a focus to promote innovative and sustainable health and education programs among underserved communities. KMET operates in 35 out of the 47 Counties in Kenya, as well as regionally in East and Central Africa. The organization engages in a number of sexual reproductive health and rights (SRHR) programs. Reproductive, Maternal, New-born and Child Health (RMNCH) KMET endeavors to promote maternal and child health (MCH) services through its RMNCH program. These include: increasing awareness to and use of contraception and comprehensive abortion care services and strengthening the capacity of the health care providers to offer youth-friendly services; Provide gynecological, antenatal and postnatal care services; wide range contraception methods, cervical cancer prevention efforts through early screening and treatment in partnership with the Cure Cervical Cancer Organization. KMET, in partnership with Harvard School and Izumi Foundation, has developed an innovative and affordable device in the management of postpartum...

April 2020 Director’s Message

April 26, 2020December 10, 2024 by Megan HuchkoNo Comments

As this very unusual semester comes to an end, the world around us is filled with uncertainty. The Covid-19 crisis has changed our learning, working, and social environments in profound ways that would have seemed unimaginable just a few months ago. The challenges of transitioning to online learning are capped by the disappointment of missing out on the rituals that come with spring at Duke, especially LDOC and graduation activities. We are faced with uncertainty about when we’ll see friends and classmates again, stress associated with working at home while ostensibly caring for and schooling our children, and navigating the continuously changing work demands and structures. On top of this, most of us are worried about the health and safety of loved ones and are wondering when we will get back to normal—and what normal will look like. It may seem that now is not the time to focus on sexual and reproductive health and to prioritize issues directly related...

An Update on the Rakellz Dream Initiative from Robert Zulu

March 9, 2020December 10, 2024 by Aarushi VenkatakrishnanNo Comments

Most cervical cancer is highly preventable and can be cured if diagnosed early, yet women across the world suffer high rates of cervical cancer. One such place is Zambia, where the Rakellz Dream Initiative was founded. After losing his wife to cervical cancer in 2015, Robert Zulu decided to launch a cervical cancer education program in Zambia. Now at 36 years old, he is the the founder and executive director of the Rakellz Dream Initiative, a non-governmental organization with a team of over 50 youth volunteers working to raise awareness around cervical cancer through outreach activities and informational films. The long-term vision of the Rakellz Dream Initiative is to help increase cervical cancer knowledge across Zambia to mitigate and prevent terminal diagnoses by the year 2025. When he spoke about his reasons for forming the Rakellz Dream Initiative, Zulu said he wanted to help reduce the ignorance about cervical cancer among the people of Zambia. “When I was nursing my late wife,...

Trump and “Birth Tourism”

January 29, 2020December 10, 2024 by Emily WoodrowNo Comments

A development to the U.S. visa policy instituted by President Trump occurred this past week on January 24th—officials now have the authority to deny a woman a tourist visa if they think that the woman is pregnant and coming to the U.S. in order to give birth (CNN). In analyzing this rule, it is pertinent to note the 14th amendment which states, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States," and it is relevant because even if a child’s parents are not citizens of the U.S., if they are born on U.S. soil, they can claim citizenship (NPR). The State Department defended the rule by stating “birth tourism poses risks to national security” and women wanting to secure citizenship for their children should not be allowed into the country (NPR). This rule however does not apply to 39 countries, the majority of which are in Europe, that...

ICPD: 25 Years Later

January 6, 2020December 10, 2024 by Aarushi VenkatakrishnanNo Comments

Article by Diya Chadha The International Conference on Population and Development held in 1994 in Cairo, Egypt, brought 179 countries together behind the common goal of bringing improved reproductive health care and rights to the forefront of international policy and development efforts. Though the call for action primarily dealt with the state of healthcare access in more developing parts of the world, as well as the way women are structurally excluded from such accessibility, the inherent link between health and empowerment was established. Thus, the idea that this access to healthcare is instrumental in achieving women’s empowerment and further gender equality was highlighted. Now 25 years later, the ICPD met in Nairobi, Kenya for ICPD25 to “re-energize” the vision put forward back in Cairo. Specifically, they have resolved to end “all maternal deaths, unmet need for family planning and gender-based violence and harmful practices against women and girls by 2030.” The price tag for this task? $264 billion. Public sector civil organizations,...

New York Passes Anti-Discrimination Laws on Basis of Reproductive Healthcare History

January 5, 2020December 10, 2024 by Aarushi VenkatakrishnanNo Comments

Article by Diya Chadha In the wake of attacks on reproductive health rights over the past year, a number of states have taken countering actions by passing pieces of statewide legislation that protect such rights. This has manifested in different ways. Earlier this year, parts of New York listed sexual and reproductive health rights as protected under the New York City Human Rights Law, with coverage ranging from being able to use birth control and contraception to having access to an abortion. New Jersey has been looking towards allocating nearly $9 million worth of state funds to organizations like Planned Parenthood to cover the gap in their funding caused by the defunding of Title X. These are just a few examples among many across the country. Just this past week, New York has again added to this set of protections by passing an antidiscrimination law protecting laborers from discrimination because of their reproductive health decision-making histories. There are three overarching sections:...

The American Anti-Abortion Strategy

December 14, 2019December 10, 2024 by Aarushi VenkatakrishnanNo Comments

Article By: Diya Chadha Over the past year, a series of restrictive anti-abortion legislation have been passed in states like Georgia, Kentucky, and Alabama. Courts have blocked their constitutionality, with the last case (Alabama) struck down this past month. Passage of such legislation would have resulted in a reversal of Roe v. Wade as many have called for six-week bans, which for many women, would limit their opportunity to get an abortion to a timeline before they may even realize they are pregnant. In other cases, states have called for outright bans on abortion at any stage of pregnancy, with no exceptions for rape and incest. The actions that are taking place “behind the scenes” of this more publicized series of events is equally as problematic. What’s worse is that they receive far less recognition as a relevant force in the anti-abortion effort. These “incremental” laws are state-by-state restrictions that impose what may seem to be minor restraints on the capabilities...

Evaluating Quality in Maternal Health Interventions Moderator Reflection

December 10, 2019December 10, 2024 by Aarushi VenkatakrishnanNo Comments

By Uma Govindswamy November, as a part of the Center for Global Health’s Reproductive Health in Africa Speaker Series, sponsored by the Africa Initiative, Dr. Joy Noel Baumgartner and Dr. Rohit Ramaswamy lectured on the topic: Evaluating Quality in Maternal Health Interventions. Dr. Joy Noel Baumgartner is the Director of the DGHI Evidence Lab, the lead of the DGHI Global Mental Health Working Group, and a professor here at Duke University. She has been an active public health practitioner and researcher for over 20 years and has worked in countries such as Cameroon, Kenya, India, South Africa, Jamaica, Tanzania, Ghana, and Uganda. Dr. Rohit Ramaswamy is Director of the Center for Global Learning and a Professor in the Department of Maternal and Child Health at UNC’s Gillings School of Global Public Health. His past research has focused on implementing delivery systems that improve the quality of healthcare for women in low-resource settings including India, Ghana, Nigeria, and Uganda, to name a...

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