Sabina Zaccaro

ROME, Mar 7 2008 (IPS) – Women have launched a renewed campaign in Italy against a move to overturn the right to abortion.
Women scientists, intellectuals and professionals are asking women to oppose a new clerical assault on women. They are fighting attempts by centre-right politicians and Catholic doctors associations to limit the current abortion law.

The law, upheld in a 1978 referendum, allows abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, and until the 24th week if the mother s life is at risk or if the foetus is seriously malformed.

Its opponents say the law should be restricted in light of medical advances allowing survival of some foetuses born before 24 weeks.

Debate and demonstrations over the law followed a call by Giuliano Fer…

Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Apr 18 2008 (IPS) – North Korea s desperate need to feed its citizens has prompted a United Nations agency to warn of a humanitarian crisis looming up in the months ahead.
The price of basic food items in Pyongyang, the country s capital, offers a stark picture of the reality average workers face when buying provisions. A kg of rice currently sells at 2,000 North Korean won (14 US dollars), up from 700-900 won a year ago, while maize costs 600 won (4.20 dollars) per kg, up from 350 won for the same amount in April 2007, states the World Food Programme (WFP).

Other staples, such as pork, potatoes and eggs have also risen manifold, making these items a luxury for most people, adds the WFP. A kg of pork now sells at 5,500 won (35 dollars), a…

Rosalia Omungo

NAIROBI, Jun 2 2008 (IPS) – The road leading to the informal settlement of Korogocho is narrow and winding. Here, in Nairobi s third largest slum, up to 150,000 people are crammed into an area of just over one square kilometre, their shanties made of cardboard, wood or metal.

A hanging toilet , in Korogocho, where water supplies are inadequate for the demands of residents. Credit: APHRC

Arguably of greater concern, thoug…

Tran Dinh Thanh Lam – Newsmekong

CAN THO, Vietnam, Jun 30 2008 (IPS) – The bustling city of Can Tho is the capital of southern Vietnam s fertile Mekong Delta and one of the country s two main rice baskets. Good food in abundance makes it an ideal place to raise ducks and chickens, but this also means it is also one of the most high-risk areas in the country for bird flu.
While new outbreaks of the disease threaten the entire country, as harvest season gets underway officials are urging farmers in the Delta to be particularly vigilant.

This is the time of the year when the whole of the Mekong Delta should keep our wits about bird flu, Nguyen Trong, a senior official in Can Tho s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development and a member of the local Bird Flu Control…

Annie Brown

WASHINGTON, Jul 30 2008 (IPS) – HIV/AIDS activists Wednesday hailed President George W. Bush s reauthorisation of the President s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) to 48 billion dollars for fiscal years 2009 to 2013 as a major step in the global fight against AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.
Paul Davis, director of Health GAP (Global Access Project), welcomed the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorisation Act of 2008 as a huge step forward for people with AIDS worldwide.

Health GAP and its allies were a leading voice in the yearlong negotiations that pushed the United States to pass legislation that they say goes beyond an increase in funding Bush s original proposal author…

Milagros Salazar

PUERTO OCOPA, Peru, Sep 15 2008 (IPS) – Ashaninka women give birth at home, in accordance with tradition, declares José Ponce, the head of the health committee in Puerto Ocopa, a village of 253 Ashaninka indigenous families deep in the central Peruvian jungle.

Native women prefer to give birth at home. Credit: Milagros Salazar/IPS.

But the Peruvian government is trying to convince indigenous women to give birth in medical facilities, in order to cut maternal and infant mortality rates.

Since 2004, i…

Diana Cariboni

MONTEVIDEO, Nov 11 2008 (IPS) – Uruguayan President Tabaré Vázquez and his cabinet have 10 days to promulgate or veto a bill that would decriminalise abortion in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, which was passed Tuesday by the Senate.
A year ago, in November 2007, the Senate approved the original version of the bill on sexual and reproductive health. On Nov. 5, it barely squeaked through the lower house of Congress, but with slight modifications, which meant it had to clear the Senate again, which it did with 17 of the 30 senators present.

However, socialist President Vázquez of the governing left-wing Broad Front has long announced that he would veto the bill.

For us, the verdict was in on Wednesday Nov. 5, but today marks the start of the …

Baradan Kuppusamy

KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 4 2009 (IPS) – A raging debate over mandatory HIV screening has exposed fear and ignorance within government, despite years of awareness campaigns to eradicate prejudice against people living with the virus and acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).
Some high officials have suggested that those with HIV be quarantined at specially constructed camps, or even isolated on islands, to safeguard the general population.

Others are calling for new mandatory rules forcing all Muslim couples, about to tie the knot, to be tested for HIV status before being allowed to marry. They also want rules to bar infected couples from having sex or having babies.

There have even been calls for mandatory screenings for all Malaysians, irrespe…

Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, Feb 18 2009 (IPS) – The food crisis that spilled over from last year could take a turn for the worse in the next decade if there are no explicit answers to a rash of growing new problems, including declining agricultural production, a faltering distribution network and a deteriorating environment worldwide.

The Polis…

Ben Case

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 24 2009 (IPS) – On World Tuberculosis Day Tuesday, the World Health Organisation (WHO) released a report showing that new surveillance techniques and more complete country reports reveal the incidence of tuberculosis (TB) co-infection with HIV to be almost double what was previously thought.

Tuberculosis bacteria multiply…