CNS: September 2024

My body - Is it my own?

Alas! it is not for 45% of women who are not empowered to make choices over their healthcare and contraception needs and choices. Nearly half of the women in 57 developing countries are denied the right to decide whether to have sex with their partners, use contraception or seek healthcare, according to UNFPA’s State of World Population Report. This lack of bodily autonomy- the right to make free and informed decisions about one’s own body, without coercion or violence- has serious implications for the health and wellbeing of women and girls.

Sexual Health with Equity (SHE) and Rights initiative (or SHE & Rights initiative) is launched to increase media understanding and engagement around sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) particularly abortion care with the lens of equity and right to health.

Co-hosted by Asia Pacific Media Alliance for Health and Development (APCAT Media), Asian-Pacific Resource & Research Centre for Women (ARROW), International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), Women's Global Network for Reproductive Rights (WGNRR), and CNS, this initiative will engage media around SRHR during September 2024 to March 2025.

Recently, over 500 feminist leaders from 38 countries across Asia and the Pacific region gathered in Chiang Mai, Thailand at the 4th Asia Pacific Feminist Forum (APFF 2024) to deliberate upon their collective journeys for building a world that is free of patriarchy, corporate capitalism, imperialism and colonialism, militarism and religious fundamentalism.

Published in IDN Bangladesh: 18 September 2024

Bangladesh has taken strong positions to prevent antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in the past. We urge the new leadership in Bangladesh to take stronger positions at the upcoming UN meeting of world leaders on 26th September 2024 on AMR and advance more concrete actions on the ground against AMR – one of the top-10 global health threats today.

This podcast features Nurgul Dzhanaeva, President of the Forum of Women's NGOs of Kyrgyzstan, who has worked on SDG-related issues at the local, national, regional and global levels. From 2016-2019, she was instrumental in initiating the campaign “From Global to Local” which sought to integrate SDG Goal 5 – to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls – into Kyrgyzstan’s local sustainable development strategies and plans.

She is in conversation with Shobha Shukla, CNS Founder Executive Director and feminist development justice leader, at the Asia Pacific Feminist Forum (APFF 2024) in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

Opening and closing instrumental piano music is played by young feminist Ms Tara Shukla Iyer from UK.

Listen to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts, TuneIn, Podtail, BluBrry, Himalaya, ListenNotes, American Podcasts, CastBox FM, Ivy FM, Player FM, iVoox, and other podcast streaming platforms.

[podcast] Reality check on gender justice in the Pacific: Nalini Singh of Fiji Women's Rights Movements speaks

This podcast features Nalini Singh, a noted Fiji's human rights activist and Executive Director of Fiji Women's Rights Movement (FWRM). She is in conversation with Shobha Shukla, a feminist development justice activist and CNS Founder Executive Director around the 4th Asia Pacific Feminist Forum on the theme of: Feminist world building - creative energies, collective journeys in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

Opening and closing instrumental piano music is played by young feminists Ms Tara Shukla Iyer and Ms Reya Shukla Iyer from UK.

Listen to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, YouTube Podcasts, TuneIn, Podtail, BluBrry, Himalaya, ListenNotes, American Podcasts, CastBox FM, Ivy FM, Player FM, iVoox, and other podcast streaming platforms.

[video] Global Media Briefing in lead up to 79th UNGA High-Level Meeting on Antimicrobial Resistance

Rocking chair syndrome gripping the TB response?

[watch the video] Akin to a rocking chair that moves forwards and backwards without any real progress, we cannot assume busy TB programmes which may appear to have a lot of movement, to be making any real progress - unless they are doing what is warranted as per science and evidence to end TB.

Let us share an old story you might have read it already. But guiding lights always guide. This is one of them for us: "Once upon a time, there was an old woman who used to go to the ocean to do her writing. She had a habit of walking on the beach every morning before she began her work. Early one morning, she was walking along the shore after a big storm had passed and found the vast beach littered with starfish as far as the eye could see. Off in the distance, she noticed a small girl approaching. As the girl walked, she paused ever so often and as she grew closer, the woman could see that the girl was occasionally bending down to pick up an object and throw it into the sea. The woman called out, "Good morning! May I ask what it is that you are doing?" The girl paused, looked up, and replied “Throwing starfish into the ocean. When the sun gets high, they will die, unless I throw them back into the water.” The woman replied, “But there must be tens of thousands of starfish on this beach. I am afraid you would not really be able to make much of a difference." The girl bent down, picked up yet another starfish and threw it as far as she could into the ocean. Then she turned, smiled and said, “It made a difference to that one!”