Ashfaq Yusufzai
PESHAWAR, Feb 19 2009 (IPS) – The battle to eradicate polio in Pakistan has become more complicated.
The government has pinned responsibility on the World Health Organisation (WHO) for the sudden spread of the P3 virus in northwestern Pakistan and the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan since 2008.
The WHO stopped the P3 vaccination causing a rise in cases in 2008, says Dr Mohammad Ali Chauhan, who is in charge of the polio eradication campaign in the North West Frontier Province (NWFP). Thirty three of the 52 cases of polio (in the province and Federally Administered Tribal Areas FATA) were of the P3 virus last year.
Since January, four new cases have been reported from Charsadda and other parts of the NWFP. Last week, a special campaign agai…
Less than one-third of Ugandan women use any form of birth control, according to the country’s 2011 Demographic and Health Survey. Credit: Andrew Green/IPS
Nov 14 2012 (IPS) – Every day at least five women are brought to the gynaecological ward of Uganda’s Mulago National Referral Hospital in Kampala for treatment for complications caused by crude attempts to terminate their pregnancies.
According to Dr. Charles Kiggundu, the head of the hospital’s gynaecological department, some of the women who come here drink gasoline or take untested combinations of herbs and drugs to induce an abortion. Others insert sticks into their vaginas.
The women at the …
Simon Baron-Cohen, Director of the Autism Research Center at the University of Cambridge, gives the keynote address during a special event held to mark World Autism Awareness Day. Credit: UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe
UNITED NATIONS, Apr 2 2017 (IPS) – Guardianship laws meant to protect people with autism actually deprive them of their basic rights and autonomy, according to experts on a UN panel.
When people with autism turn 18, their parents or other caregivers are encouraged to legally become their guardians. However, as Zoe Gross an autism self-advocate says the practice deprives people with autism of the ability to influence their own lives.
Gross was on…
Nomcebo Mkhaliphi posing with girls from the Kwaluseni Infantry Primary School in Eswatini. Courtesy: Nomcebo Mkhaliphi
MBABANE , Jan 21 2020 (IPS) – When 14-year-old Nomcebo Mkhaliphi first noticed the blood discharged from her vagina, she was shocked. Confused, she turned to her older sisters for advice.
“My sisters told me that they were experiencing the same every month and that they used fabric, toilet paper and newspapers as sanitary wear,” recalls the now 45-year-old Mkhaliphi. She had to follow suit and use these materials because she had no money to buy sanitary pads.
Mkhaliphi an…
A market vendor sells produce at Victoria Market in Port Victoria, Seychelles. Credit: UN Women/Ryan Brown
BRIGHTON, UK, Sep 20 2021 (IPS) – COVID-19 has exposed numerous fractures in global food systems that leave millions at risk of food insecurity. Like the numerous political failures in dealing with COVID, the repercussions of food system failings are experienced by rich and poor countries alike, with the poorest and most marginalised paying the greatest price.
To be clear, while the numbers of those who are undernourished remain shamefully high, this is a food crisis that is not just about hunger or famine. There is also a silent and growing crisis of an estimate…
KUALA LUMPUR and SYDNEY, Feb 9 2021 (IPS) – Refusal to temporarily suspend several World Trade Organization (WTO) intellectual property (IP) provisions to enable much faster and broader progress in addressing the COVID-19 pandemic should be grounds for International Criminal Court prosecution for genocide.
Jomo Kwame Sundaram
Making life-saving vaccines, medicines and equipment available, freely or affordably, has been crucial for containing the spread of many infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, HIV-AIDS, polio and smallpox.
Jonas Salk, who developed the polio vaccine, insisted that it remain patent free. Asked who owned the patent 65 years ago, he , “The peo…