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In August 2017, Madagascar began experiencing a large outbreak of plague affecting major cities and other non-endemic areas. By the end of October 2017, a total of 1801 confirmed, probable and suspected cases of plague, including 127 deaths, were reported by the Ministry of Health of Madagascar to the World Health Organization (WHO), and 51 of 114 of Madagascar's districts were affected. WHO was producing new outbreak reports every few days.
According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), “good sexual and reproductive health (SRH) is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being in all matters relating to the reproductive system. It implies that people are able to have a satisfying and safe sex life, the capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and how often to do so."
On June 24, 2017, UNICEF and the World Health Organization released a statement that the cholera outbreak in Yemen which began in October of 2016, was "the worst cholera outbreak in the world."
At that time, the outbreak exceeded 200,000 suspected cases, increasing at an average of 5,000 a day. In just a few months, cholera had spread to almost every governorate in Yemen. Since the oubreak began, more than 1,300 people had died – one quarter of them children – and, at the time of this writing, the death toll was expected to rise.
Healthy Timing and Spacing of Pregnancy (HTSP) is an intervention to help women and families delay or space their pregnancies in order to achieve the healthiest outcomes for women, newborns, infants and children. According to WHO, qualitative studies conducted by USAID in Pakistan, India, Bolivia, and Peru showed that women and couples are interested in the healthiest time to become pregnant
Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C refers to all procedures involving partial or total removal of external portions of or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons. More than 200 million women and girls alive today have undergone FGM/C according to the World Health Organization. While reports suggest that the rate at which FGM/C is practiced is dropping in some areas, as many as 30 million girls under the age of 15 may still be at risk for the procedure. The practice is most common in the western, eastern, and north-eastern regions of Africa, in some countries in Asia and the Middle East, and among migrants from these areas to North America and Europe.
[UPDATED July 2017J Pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, is a medication which, when taken daily, can protect those who are not HIV positive avoid HIV infection. It is a critical prevention method for those who are at substantial risk for HIV infection.
The malaria community has made great strides in reducing morbidity and mortality in recent years – with World Health Organization reports noting that there has been a 37% global decrease in malaria incidence and a 60% global decrease in malaria deaths between 2000 and 2015.
In the last decade, child, early and forced marriage (CEFM) has affected about 58 million girls. Many of these girls are extremely young, even as young as eight, and are married against their will. In some cultures every seventh girl is married before she reaches the tender age of 15, and age when she should just be finding out about herself, her body, and her potential.
Dengue has emerged as a worldwide problem since the 1950s, and is endemic in Puerto Rico and in Latin America, Southeast Asia and the Pacific islands. It is a leading cause of death in those areas.
[UPDATED JULY 2016] Tremendous strides have been made in the past several decades in saving the lives of mothers and children. The numbers of those dying has decreased dramatically, thanks to the tireless efforts of governments, international organizations, communities, and individual households. Yet, with all of this progress, the numbers are still unacceptably high.
