Recently, a number of feminists, and feminist organizations met to analyze the root causes of the unequal access to health and life-saving vaccines globally. A key factor contributing to this injustice is the hoarding of vaccines by wealthy Northern States and the interference of powerful transnational corporations and philanthrocapitalists in the efforts to secure an affordable global Covid-19 vaccine. 

This case study explores the agendas, strategies, and influence of Christian fundamentalist actors in HIV and AIDS responses in the African region.

This report presents the results from the AWID 2008 global survey of donors and women’s rights activists in relation to the funding sources, the conditionalities, and amounts given to women’s organisations to address HIV and AIDS.

I first heard about Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) at the age of 19. To be honest, at that time for me it was nothing but nice pictures (as each goal had its own symbol) with nice slogans — just a wish list.  I got to familiarize myself with the concept of accountability and how governments should be accountable to international community but more importantly, towards their own people. Gradually, I started to understand what it was all about, that if it works that means me, my family, my relatives, my friends, just people around me should live better.

AWID spoke with Pierre Meyer author of the report “Do Not Wake up a Sleeping Lion: Mapping the legal environment of LGBTQ persons in Francophone West Africa”.

The Youth Coalition for Sexual and Reproductive Rights (YCSRR) and Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID) applaud the Commission’s focus on the assessment of the status of implementation of the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development.

We ask the members of the CPD47 to build upon the principles agreed to during the affirmation of ICPD in 1994 along with its 5 and 10 years review the 1994 ICPD and develop a rights-based approach to youth and adolescent sexual rights within the post-2015 development agenda.

FRIDAY FILE: The war against HIV and AIDS cannot be won without a rights based approach.

By Kathambi Kinoti

Three initial cases against the government of Namibia have begun in the capital, Windhoek. The cases have been brought by HIV positive women who claim that they were sterilized in government hospitals without their consent. The women are suing the Ministry of Health and social services for what they term as a violation of their human rights and discrimination based on their health status.

By Alice Mutuma

FRIDAY FILE: At a recent international conference in Tunis[1] on Sexual and Reproductive Health in Arab Countries, AWID met Jocelyn DeJong, professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at American University in Beirut and coordinator of the Reproductive Health Working Group[2], to learn more about their research on the role of associations in fighting HIV stigmatization.

By Mégane Ghorbani