Status of Women committee  Thank you. I circulated ahead of time the consensus document from the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health, and the “Call to Action”, both of which essentially have the partnership's broad-based position on what needs to be done, how much it's going to cost, and ho

Status of Women committee  I'll start briefly. I think you've hit on something that is definitely important. It underpins all of these efforts in several countries. Bangladesh is one of them, Ethiopia is another, and Mali is another where child marriage in particular, regardless of laws that may have bee

Status of Women committee  That figure actually comes from the Guttmacher “Adding It Up” report, which is about a combination of family planning and maternal health care. That 70% is from that combination. It doesn't include access to abortion. You can save even more lives if you add in access to safe abor

Status of Women committee  I think the very first thing we need, and we already have it in several African countries--in fact in most African countries, but not all--is a real political willingness in the country to engage, to make commitments, including commitments to their own health budgets so this can

Status of Women committee  Unfortunately, my partner in crime, so to speak, the coordinator for the partnership in Canada, is not here today, and she has quite a bit of experience in terms of the agricultural area. She is an economist. We'll be pleased to provide you with that information if that would be

Status of Women committee  I'll take a stab at the first question you asked, and others may wish to comment. I think that at this point a funded mechanism for the G-8 initiative has not been determined, as I understand it. Therefore, what really needs to be determined is how the commitments that were mad

Status of Women committee  Thank you. I think there are several answers to your question, and I'm sure my colleagues will be happy to contribute as well. First of all, I think the reason there has been much more attention paid to child health is that it is actually easier to save lives quickly through im

Status of Women committee  Again, it's going to depend on the country. The last maternal mortality audit figures for South Africa made it clear that HIV/AIDS was the most common cause of death, except that it's an indirect cause of death. What that really means is that it's not a primary cause. Women might

Status of Women committee  There are 68.

Status of Women committee  Thank you. Thailand, as I said, is just one example. We could give you Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and in fact Brazil. Brazil is probably the most recent example where they have managed to reduce the under-five death rate and they've now managed to get free primary health care for ever

Status of Women committee  Yes. I think that the whole point of any initiative--and certainly the one that's envisioned by the partnership, by the NGOs in Canada who have been working on this, and I believe by the Canadian government and the G-8--is that this has to be an initiative that begins with commun

Status of Women committee  I would say two things in answer to your question. First of all, will all target countries achieve millennium development goal 5? The answer is no. At the same time, many of them can—or at least they can come close. They can certainly make very significant progress. I think that,

Status of Women committee  I also wasn't at the earlier session today, but I think Jill already referred to the $15 billion in potential or real productivity that's lost every year related to maternal deaths. I think I did give you some figures on what it will cost, in one of the slides in my presentation.

Status of Women committee  Good afternoon everyone, Madam Chair, Dr. Fry and members of the committee. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to meet with you. I will speak in English because it will be easier for me to explain these very important things. The Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Chil