CNS: January 2014

8 tips for using Twitter effectively around World Cancer Day

"Eight tips for using Twitter around health-related events" was first prepared by @francetim (Inis Communication) and @GlobalHealthTom in collaboration with CNS and was launched at the 11th International Conference on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific. Since then it has adapted and used by delegates of various health-related events around the world (and those not attending but following these events online). Most recently it was adapted and disseminated by Union International for Cancer Control (UICC)/ World Cancer Day, Inis Communication and CNS. This brief guide provides eight simple tips to make the most of one social media platform – Twitter – around the World Cancer Day (4th February 2014). Please contact Inis Communication for getting this guide adapted to your health event!

Long road to justice and equality for LGBTI people

Shobha Shukla, CNS Columnist
The recently concluded 7th Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights (7th APCRSHR) in Manila saw some interesting discussions on protecting and advancing Sexual Orientation And Gender Identity (SOGI) rights and improving their access to Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) services. While LGBTI (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex people) form a sizeable population in Asia, their general and unique health needs are largely ignored or at the best seen through the HIV lens. Facing rejection and discrimination, even within the family and community, they are subject to violence in various forms - physical, psychological, sexual, economic and social. And yet they generally do not report cases out of fear of exposure, ignorance of the law, and due to self- stigma.

Smoking Goes Electronic

Shobha Shukla - CNS

[हिंदी] ‘Smoke healthy, Lite-joy-- A better alternative'; ‘Health e-cigarettes—Smoke and Quit Whenever'; 'Vapours- benefits of e-cigarettes'; 'Green-Smart-Living - easiest and most affordable way to start living a smoke-free life'... These are just a few of the several online advertisements one comes across these days-- all glorifying electronic cigarettes.

Shobha Shukla - CNS
Worldwide, a woman dies of cervical cancer every two minutes, taking the annual toll to 275,000. The disease is preventable, and yet the second largest killer of women in low and middle income countries, with most women dying in the prime of life. According to the Cervical Cancer Global Crisis Card, India tops the chart in cervical cancer deaths with nearly 73,000 women dying every year, representing 26.4% of the global deaths.

Swapna Majumdar - CNS
Over three million children died before their fifth birthday in 2010 alone in the Asia Pacific region. Thousands of mothers continue to die unnecessarily while giving birth with this region accounting for close to half of the nearly 500,000 maternal deaths recorded annually across the world. Many of these deaths can be prevented if sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services are accessible and affordable. It is here that innovative government health programmes can make a difference.

Photo credit: Swapna Majumdar

Swapna Majumdar - CNS

In India, 17 percent of female sex workers reported starting to sell sex under the age of 15 years.
In Maldives and Papua New Guinea, the median age reported among female sex workers ranged from 17-19 years (across surveyed sites), as compared to a range of 22-24 years of age in sites in Cambodia, Malaysia and Pakistan.
In Pakistan, 'hijras' (transgender persons) and male sex workers reported starting to sell sex at a mean age of 16 years.

Swapna Majumdar - CNS
[7th APCRSHR Images] Twenty years after the path breaking International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) held in Cairo, millions of women and adolescents, particularly the poor and marginalised, in Asia and the Pacific continue to face inequalities in access to reproductive and sexual health and rights.

Dr Eden R Divinagracia,
Chair, 7th APCRSHR (right)

Shobha Shukla - CNS
The theme of the 7th Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights (7th APCRSHR), which opened in Manila on 21st January, 2014, is: Examining achievements, good practices, lessons learned and challenges: towards a strategic positioning of Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights. In an interview given to Citizen News Service (CNS), Dr Eden R Divinagracia, Executive Director, Philippine NGO Council on Population, Health and Welfare, and Chair of 7th APCRSHR lamented that currently abortions are illegal and unconstitutional in Philippines, and yet the country has more than 500,000 cases of abortions every year.

Photo credit: CAMI-IMPT

Shobha Shukla - CNS
[7th APCRSHR Images] Millions of women and girls around the world are still unable to protect themselves from sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Over 1 million people contract a sexually transmitted infection every day, half of whom are young people - mostly women. In fact women are 5 times more likely to get STIs than men. Also, currently 222 million women have an unmet need for contraception and approximately 290,000 women in developing countries die from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth every year.

"Eight tips for using Twitter around health-related events" was first prepared by @francetim (Inis Communication) and @GlobalHealthTom in collaboration with CNS and was launched at the 11th International Conference on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific. Since then it has adapted and used by delegates of various health-related events around the world (and those not attending but following these events online). Most recently it was adapted and disseminated by Mulat Pinoy, CNS and Inis Communication at 7th Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights (7th APCRSHR). This brief guide provides eight simple tips to make the most of one social media platform – Twitter – around 7th APCRSHR. Please contact Inis Communication for getting this guide adapted to your health event!

Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights: A distant reality?

(Based on an interview with Dr Amita Pandey, Associate Professor, Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, King George's Medical University - KGMU)

[7th APCRSHR Images] Before 7th Asia Pacific Conference on Reproductive and Sexual Health and Rights (7th APCRSHR) opens in Manila later this week, Citizen News Service (CNS) spoke with Dr Amita Pandey on sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) challenges in India.

- Those children who were left out can receive their dose on 28th January -
Over 1.7 crore children in Bihar were targeted for deworming treatment using Albendazole, on 23rd January. Albendazole is drug recommended by the World Health Organization to combat parasitic worms, and has been safely used to treat hundreds of millions of children worldwide.

Citizen News Service (CNS) is pleased to announce that it is currently accepting applications for new fellows for its CNS Health Fellowship Programme 2014. This programme offers mentorship, peer support, networking opportunities, and technical assistance to health writers on neglected health priorities.

[हिंदी] Rehabilitating communal violence survivors is State's responsibility, was echoed by the members of Socialist Party (India) in their procession and demonstration in UP state capital of Lucknow on 8th January 2014. Since permission was not granted to Socialist Party (India) to hold the demonstration at Gandhi Pratima in Lucknow city-centre (Hazratganj), the administration received the memorandum from them, after which this demonstration converted into a procession that marched to Lakshman Mela grounds where it continued the protest till the evening.

'Why I am not in Aam Aadmi Party?'

Dr Sandeep Pandey, Magsaysay Awardee and CNS Columnist

[First published in Tehelka] Some friends are calling to suggest that I should join Aam Aadmi Party while others want to know whether they should join. Some think that I am close to AAP and want me to recommend their names as candidate for the next general elections from their respective constituencies while some experts of different fields are offering their services for the benefit of schemes for poor to be implemented by AAP in Delhi.