Urge universal access to reproductive health

Demographers at the United Nations Population Fund estimate that we are adding 219,000 people to the planet per day and that the world population, 7 billion people today, could grow to 8 billion by 2025 and 10 billion by 2083. The path of future population growth depends in large part on how quickly fertility rates will drop around the world. The extent to which women’s needs for reproductive health and family planning services are met will play a role in determining whether world population peaks this century, or continues growing to 2100 and beyond.

The final report of the United Nations Millennium Project, “Investing in Development”, stresses the importance of investing in sexual and reproductive health as part of overall development efforts, especially to strengthen health systems and improve public health. Expanding access to sexual and reproductive health services, including family planning, has been identified as one of the “quick wins” for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

According to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), voluntary family planning has profound health, economic, and social benefits for families and communities:

• Protecting the health of women by reducing high-risk pregnancies
• Protecting the health of children by allowing sufficient time between pregnancies
• Fighting HIV/AIDS through providing information, counselling, and access to male and female condoms
• Reducing abortions
• Supporting women’s rights and opportunities for education, employment, and full participation in society
• Protecting the environment by stabilising population growth

Roman Catholicism, through its political wing, the Holy See, is the only religion with a seat in the United Nations. The Vatican has used this status as well as its influence on Catholic politicians around the world to press policies against contraception and abortion, which has serious implications for the availability of such services to non-Catholics as well as Catholics. Referring to the Church’s teaching on contraception, Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae, the renowned Swiss Catholic theologian Hans Küng writes:

This teaching … has laid a heavy burden on the conscience of innumerable people, even in industrially developed countries with declining birthrates. But for the people in many underdeveloped countries, especially in Latin America, it constitutes a source of incalculable harm, a crime in which the Church has implicated itself.

In 2009, President Barack Obama lifted a ban on US funding for international health groups that perform abortions, promote legalizing the procedure or provide counselling about terminating pregnancies. Obama issued a memorandum rescinding the Mexico City Policy, also known as the “global gag rule”, which President Ronald Reagan originally instituted in 1984, President Bill Clinton reversed in 1993 and President George W. Bush revived in 2001. The memorandum revoked Bush’s order, calling the limitations on funding “excessively broad” and adding that “they have undermined efforts to promote safe and effective voluntary family programs in foreign nations”.

The consequences of not using family planning and reproductive health services are grave and diverse. The non-use of contraception in developing countries, for example, results in overpopulation leading to the degradation of the environment and increased civil conflict, exacerbated by the fight over scarce resources. In addition, these burgeoning populations lead to growing communities of young people of reproductive age, many of whom are not able to receive adequate reproductive health care. This then leads to health problems during childbirth, as well as increased rates of maternal, infant, and child mortality and added health problems in newborns.

Maternal mortality is a human rights issue of tremendous urgency and impact. The Human Rights Council reports that each year, 529,000 women die from pregnancy-related causes. This is one death every minute. No single cause of death and disability for men comes close. Human rights challenges related to maternal mortality and morbidity are present in all regions of the world and affect both developing and developed countries. The international community has committed itself to reducing maternal mortality and morbidity, as set out in the 2000 Millennium Declaration (A/RES/55/2) and the 2005 World Summit Outcome (A/RES/60/1). Despite these commitments, of all the MDG Goals, Goal 5 on improving maternal health is the furthest from realisation.

Hans Rosling on HIV: New facts and stunning data visuals

The non-use of reproductive services and contraception also leads to the spread of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and HIV/AIDS. Worldwide, the AIDS epidemic is responsible for over 20 million deaths, and 40 million people today are living with HIV. Educating populations about the transmission of HIV between sexual partners as well as from mothers to their children, and demonstrating behaviours that can prevent HIV/AIDS and other STIs is a vital part of stemming the spread of these diseases.

HIV/AIDS and STIs are entirely preventable. By creating strong positive role models and demonstrating the consequences of “risky” sexual behaviour, family planning and reproductive health programs help to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS and other STIs.