World Water Day: Progress Made, Work Still to Do

March 21, 2012 at 3:52 PM

A Romani family wash with water from the polluted stream nearby their home in an informal settlement in Slovenia. Water from the polluted stream is used for washing, cooking, bathing and drinking.

Earlier this month, the UN made a major announcement: the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) target on access to safe drinking water worldwide has been met.

This comes years ahead of the 2015 deadline, and is one of the first of the MDG targets—focused on reduction of extreme poverty and associated development issues—to be met. Yes, it’s a huge accomplishment. But, it masks extraordinary human rights violations.

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I Stand With…the Right to Health

By Lisa Schechtman

February 3, 2012 at 10:29 AM

planned parenthood Before you keep reading, let’s be clear: this blog is about the universal human right to the highest attainable standard of health, the package of services it takes to be well—and the ability to afford it. It’s also about the implications of the Susan G. Komen Foundation’s decision to stop providing grants to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America for breast cancer screening. Because too often, women’s health falls victim to agendas that prevent women from exercising their human rights. It’s about the big picture.

According to Planned Parenthood, the vast majority of its services are the provision of information and education about health, well-being and sexuality; prevention of and response to gender-based violence; prevention and treatment of sexually transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS; and family planning counseling and supplies. These services are provided to both men and women, of all ages, of all income levels. They are part of basic health care.

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Exciting Progress for Health Care Equality!

By Cristina Finch

October 21, 2011 at 11:56 AM

Community Health Center Gives Newborn Care Class For Low-Income Parents

A mother holds her infant during a check-up at a clinic for low-income families. ©John Moore/Getty Images

As Amnesty International’s recent reports on maternal health have highlighted, discrimination in health care in the United States is severe and pervasive. But recently introduced legislation would help end discrimination and improve the quality of health care in the United States.

Last month, Congresswoman Barbara Lee from California introduced the Health Equity and Accountability Act of 2011 (HEAA). Passing this legislation will help eliminate disparities in access to health care and in health outcomes for communities of color. The HEAA ensures that a full range of culturally appropriate public health services are available and accessible to communities of color, and that services are available in the languages used by those communities. The bill also provides training opportunities for health care workers to better address particular health issues facing marginalized communities.

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Occupy Wall Street: If Banks Are Too Big to Fail, Are People Too Small to Matter?

By Curt Goering

October 19, 2011 at 3:49 PM

Protesters affiliated with the Occupy Wall Street movement rally in Foley Square before marching through Lower Manhattan (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Originally posted to The Guardian

Occupy Wall Street protesters are understandably angry at the support given big business, while individuals struggle against high unemployment, costly health care coverage and shrinking social services.

A little while ago, opponents of universal health care coverage in the United States claimed that it was a “moral hazard.” The argument characterized people as lazy and irresponsible, prone to “abuse” the system at significant cost to society but none to themselves. The logic and economy of preventative care was largely ignored, as was the fact that access to health care is a human right.

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Remembering 9/11

By Tom Parker

September 11, 2011 at 8:00 AM

On September 11^th, 2001, my wife and son were in Logan Airport waiting to board a flight to New York. I was almost 4,000 miles away working in Mostar, Bosnia.

At the time I was a war crimes investigator working for the United Nations and I was in Mostar to take a statement from a former Bosnian Prisoner of War who had been tortured by his captors.

When we finished for the day I went next door to a small café and my eye was drawn to the television in the corner, which was running footage of emergency crews responding to some kind of major disaster.

It took a few minutes for the full story of what had happened in New York to unfold and, as it did so, my blood ran cold.

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Is Sierra Leone’s Free Healthcare Program for Pregnant Women and Children Working?

By Guest Writer

September 7, 2011 at 5:03 PM

By Kim Lanegran, Amnesty USA Country Specialist for Sierra Leone

sierra leone mother and baby It’s been a little over a year since the government of Sierra Leone launched its groundbreaking free healthcare program for children and pregnant women.

While we’re thrilled about the good news — more women now receive pre and post-natal health care, over 39,000 women delivered their babies in health care facilities, and many lives have been saved — there is still a lot to be done.

Amnesty International’s new report on the Free Health Policy finds that free adequate care is simply not being delivered.

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Renowned Iranian HIV/AIDS Doctor Imprisoned For Doing His Job

By Elise Auerbach

August 11, 2011 at 2:29 PM

Update 8/29/11: Dr. Arash Alaei has been released! Thank you to everyone who took action!

Dr. Arash Alaei teaching © Physicians For Human Rights

Brothers Kamiar and Arash Alaei, both doctors, have dedicated their lives to helping some of the most marginalized and stigmatized groups in Iranian society—HIV-infected drug users and prison inmates. They established innovative and humane public health programs and became internationally recognized experts in the prevention and treatment of HIV/AIDS.

Their hard work brought rare favorable world attention to the Islamic Republic; the programs the brothers created were considered models by the international health community.

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The U.S. Maternal Health Crisis: 14 Numbers You Need To Know

By Jason Disterhoft

May 3, 2011 at 8:10 AM

Every 90 seconds a woman dies giving birth.

Mother’s Day is Sunday, May 8. Here at Amnesty, we’re honoring mothers by fighting for maternal health — sending Mother’s Day action cards to U.S. and international decision-makers, hosting events and more (sign up here).

We’re also launching a one-year update to our groundbreaking report, Deadly Delivery: The Maternal Health Care Crisis in the USA. From that update, here are 14 numbers you need to know:

49: The number of countries that have lower maternal mortality ratios than the US. Women in the US are more likely to die of pregnancy related complications than in 49 other countries, including nearly all European countries, Canada and several countries in Asia and the Middle East.

4 million: The number of women who give birth each year in the US. Childbirth related care is the most common reason for hospitalization in the US.

$98 billion: The total amount spent in the US each year on hospital bills related to childbirth. The average health care provider fees for maternal care are twice as high as any other country.

3 to 4x: African-American women are 3 to 4 times as likely to die from pregnancy-related causes as white women.

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This Mother's Day, Write For Moms Worldwide

By Heather Lasher

May 2, 2011 at 1:54 PM

A woman holds a photograph of Tatia Oden French, who died in 2001 after an induced labor.

This year, Mom won’t be the only person receiving a Mother’s Day card.

Giving birth in the United States is more dangerous than in 49 other countries. In the last 24 hours, around the world, almost 1,000 women have died from complications of pregnancy and childbirth. Maternal health is a human right — and there’s no better time than Mother’s Day to let Congress and other leaders around the world know that you care about the lives of women worldwide.

Join the fight for maternal health by requesting Mother’s Day action cards to send to U.S. and world decision-makers. Let us know how many cards you’d like by registering online (they come in sets of six).

These Mother’s Day cards aren’t destined for the shoebox or the refrigerator. Send them back to us and we’ll take them straight to your Members of Congress, urging them to support the Maternal Health Accountability Act, which would take vital steps to improve maternal health in the U.S. We’ll send other cards to leaders in Peru and Burkina Faso, urging them to improve their countries’ troubling maternal health records.

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First Year of Sierra Leone’s Free Care Policy

By Guest Writer

April 28, 2011 at 8:37 AM

By Kim Lanegran, Sierra Leone Country Specialist

Pregnant women at a maternity waiting house

On April 27^th, Sierra Leoneans celebrated two important anniversaries: 50 years of independence from Great Britain; one year of free health care to children under five and pregnant and lactating women.

Since independence, Sierra Leone has struggled from crushing poverty, human rights atrocities and a decade of horrible civil war. When the war ended in 2002, Sierra Leone faced many challenges, not the least of which was that it was among the very worst countries in the world to be a pregnant woman or a child.

Amnesty International played a pivotal role drawing attention to the human costs of inadequate maternal health care in Sierra Leone and helped Sierra Leoneans demand reforms from their government. Amnesty’s work emphasizing that maternal health is a human right and that other human rights abuses, such as gender discrimination, exacerbate the failure of health care delivery was crucial.

This work continues in Sierra Leone, Africa and throughout the world. Join us in shining a light on maternal health this Mother’s Day.

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Human Rights Now Blog

Tag Archives: health care is a human right

I Stand With…the Right to Health

Exciting Progress for Health Care Equality!

Remembering 9/11

Is Sierra Leone’s Free Healthcare Program for Pregnant Women and Children Working?

Renowned Iranian HIV/AIDS Doctor Imprisoned For Doing His Job

First Year of Sierra Leone’s Free Care Policy