This paper focuses on the socio-cultural context in which the enactment of 'high risk' youth sexual activity takes place. The author maintains that understanding youth sexual culture and the context of high-risk sexual activity will provide the basis upon which programmes aimed at promoting safer sex practices are designed. It is concluded that the future may quite literally depend on the extent to which the current culture/context in which young people are developing their ideas about sex, and enacting their sexuality, can be transformed.
Governance and participation in health
YOUTH, HIV/AIDS AND THE IMPORTANCE OF SEXUAL CULTURE AND CONTEXT
South Africa's HIV/AIDS YOUTH PROGRAMMES PAY OFF
The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) says South Africa's responses to the impact of the disease on young people, are paying off. Releasing its latest report on the epidemic, the UNAIDS said HIV prevalence among teenagers in South Africa shrank between 1998 and 2001.
The Million Signature Campaign - Demanding Health For All Now!
"In the next 24 hours, over 30,000 children will die from preventable diseases on our planet earth. Today, while the world is writing a collective obituary of the future generation, we know why they are dying and we know who are responsible for these deaths. We also know how these deaths can be stopped. We urge you to join 'The Million Signature Campaign', - a march demanding health for all."
TRADITIONAL MEDICINE AND REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH IN AFRICA
There has been intense public health debate in many parts of Africa to determine the most appropriate official policy towards traditional medicines for reproductive health care. The author of this editorial argues that because traditional practitioners work more closely with the grassroots compared to orthodox practitioners, traditional practitioners would be more able to advocate for changing behaviours that impact negatively on reproductive health in Africa.
Young Heed AIDS Warning
More young South Africans are heeding safe sex campaigns and cutting their chances of getting AIDS or the HIV virus which causes it, a new survey said last month, heartening the nation worst hit by the pandemic. But despite the promising trend the survey highlighted high infection levels among young children. It also urged the government to act quickly to give people with HIV the anti-retroviral drugs which can slow the onset of AIDS.
Bush Government Threatens To Roll Back Women's Reproductive Rights
Sign the Petition
"As supporters of women's rights worldwide, we are deeply disturbed by the statement made by a US delegate at the recent Preparatory Meeting for the forthcoming Fifth Asian and Pacific Population Conference that will take place 11-17 December 2002 in Bangkok. The US has threatened to withdraw from the Cairo Programme of Action of 1994 unless the words reproductive health services and reproductive rights are taken out or changed. This is a shocking development which is a threat to women's rights and women's health world wide. We demand that the Cairo Program of Action that has been endorsed by 179 nations be upheld. Reproductive health services and reproductive rights are essential human rights. Reproductive rights and reproductive health services are integral to the Cairo Program of Action. If the US breaks their commitment to the United Nations and to the world community, there will be disastrous consequences for women in all parts of the world who are in need of safe and effective contraceptive and abortion information and services. The position that the Bush administration has taken sets back the efforts of women's organisations by several decades and needs to be resisted. We urge you to make your own statement of protest and send it to the US administration, to the UN and to sign our petition on line at: http://www.PetitionOnline.com/USantiWO/petition.html."
Further details: /newsletter/id/29433
Bush Government Threatens To Roll Back Women's rights
Sign the Petition
"As supporters of women's rights worldwide, we are deeply disturbed by the statement made by a US delegate at the recent Preparatory Meeting for the forthcoming Fifth Asian and Pacific Population Conference that will take place 11-17 December 2002 in Bangkok. The US has threatened to withdraw from the Cairo Programme of Action of 1994 unless the words 'reproductive health services' and 'reproductive rights' are taken out or changed. This is a shocking development which is a threat to women's rights and women's health world wide. We demand that the Cairo Program of Action that has been endorsed by 179 nations be upheld. Reproductive health services and reproductive rights are essential human rights. Reproductive rights and reproductive health services are integral to the Cairo Program of Action. If the US breaks their commitment to the United Nations and to the world community, there will be disastrous consequences for women in all parts of the world who are in need of safe and effective contraceptive and abortion information and services. The position that the Bush administration has taken sets back the efforts of women's organisations by several decades and needs to be resisted. We urge you to make your own statement of protest and send it to the US administration, to the UN and to sign our petition on line at: http://www.PetitionOnline.com/USantiWO/petition.html."
Further details: /newsletter/id/29434
O&M of urban water and sanitation systems: is there a role for the poor?
Urban services specialists are coming to realise that sustainability of infrastructure interventions depends on community engagement in operation and maintenance (O&M). But what progress has been made in getting urban communities involved in the planning, construction, repair and maintenance of water supply and sewerage systems? Are projects demand-driven and are communities willing to pay to look after them?
Capacity for Development: new solutions to old problems
UNDP
Edited by: Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, Carlos Lopes and Khalid Malik, 2002.
The book contains a range of views from practitioners,academics and policy-makers about what has gone right with technical cooperation in recent years, what has gone wrong,and how to do it better and perhaps very differently.In so doing,it focuses on the questions of indigenous capacity, ownership, civic engagement and new possibilities for knowledge-sharing, for which the revolution in information and communications technologies offers ample opportunities.
A Just and Sustainable World is Possible
Civil Society Declaration at Johannesburg
We representatives of diverse civil society groups gathered in Johannesburg, affirm the value of the process of the Earth Summit, but we disassociate ourselves with deep concern from the outcomes of the world summit on Sustainable Development. We are alarmed that the governments of the world continue to show a tragic unwillingness to translate the RIO principles into concrete action and to display an appalling lack of determination to commit themselves to the objectives of Agenda 21. Instead they have shown an irresponsible subservience to corporate led globalisations and have made attempts to role back the commitments they reached in Rio.
Further details: /newsletter/id/29302