Monday March 17th
"Data-Revolution" is the CSW58 buzzword and it means doing a better job of capturing gender statistics for the Post-2015 Agenda. Mexico presented a program on making women more visible through indicators and tracking statistics that are gender specific. Governments need to capture disaggregated information on unpaid work, care-giving, access to healthcare and resources, wealth, income, violence, education, land rights, etc
"More than Mothers" was a session on sexual and reproductive rights and maternal mortality, both outstanding failures of the Millennium Development Goals. South African presenter, Daphney Conco, observed that maternal indicators are measured by deaths, which probably says a lot about what is wrong with the MDG approach to women's health, and human rights. Ariel Frisancho confirmed that averages do mask extreme inequalities in Peru, where maternal mortality is 5 times the national average in some regions, and abortion is the third leading cause of maternal death. 44% of women in Nepal have uterine prolapse in their 20s because of rape, early (young age) birth and unattended difficult labor. The most outstanding failure though is girls reproductive health: every day 20,000 girls below the age of 18 give birth in developing countries and one in 10 has a child before the age of 15 in Bangladesh, Chad, Guinea, Mali, Mozambique and Niger. Considering the overall lack of progress in this area, it is just incredible that global investment in 'family planning' (which is code for sex education and reproductive health) decreased steadily through 2012.
For a full report on Adolescent Pregnancy go to http://www.unfpa.org/webdav/site/global/shared/swp2013/EN-SWOP2013-final.pdf
Erica Higbie