Approximately 30% of maternal deaths in Pakistan are attributable to the second delay in the ‘Three Delays Model’ ( i.e. delay in the decision to seek care; delay in arriving at a health facility; delay in receiving adequate care at the facility). Many women who cannot reach primary care facilities have to deliver at home. In complicated cas...

In last week’s IHP newsletter intro, Kristof wondered  what “the real story” is. Because in the past few weeks, I too felt really delusional, I decided to go for a reality check – what, indeed, is the real story? Phenomenological accounts of delusions suggest that delusions are not nonsense, but more adequately understood as a different ...

Six years are left to meet the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a ringing bell for the upcoming High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF), taking place at the UN Headquarters, in New York, from 8 to 17 July 2024. In the most recent Sustainable Development Report 2024 by the UN Sustainable Development S...

Our surroundings undoubtedly affect our health, shape our routines, and ultimately impact our lives and long-term health outcomes. Recent research highlights how various neighborhood characteristics impact physical and mental health, and this both at individual and population level. As our understanding of these connections and the underlying bi...

In the busy hallway of one of the health centers in the Amhara region of Ethiopia, I encountered Melat, a middle-aged woman whose tired eyes revealed the weight of her troubles. Despite living with diabetes for years, Melat’s understanding of self-management was rudimentary at best. Like many others in her neighborhood, she relied on a few presc...

If you followed last week’s 77th World Health Assembly (WHA) – the WHO’s governing body composed of its 194 member states – through press release headlines, it was a historic success. WHO’s Director-General Dr. Tedros closed the week by stating WHA77 had been a “victory for multilateralism”. “Landmark” resolutions were passed on ...

Although it’s difficult to compare for me, the 77th World Health Assembly (WHA77) has a unique character. It is driven by a kind of pressure, gentle but eloquent. This pressure, aside from the declarations of civil society and frantic social media activity of many actors present in Geneva, can be seen and felt in the gestures, the looks, and t...

When Sunda goes to prepare dinner for her family, she first goes to a nearby bush to forage for wood or animal dung to use as cooking fuel. After hours pass, she decides she has enough, so she walks home and begins building a fire in the cooking pit. She asks her son to go to the community spicket to collect water to boil for today’s meal and ...

Imagine starting your period for the first time, completely unprepared and alone. Sadly, this is the reality for nearly half of all girls in India due to a pervasive culture of silence surrounding menstruation. Menstrual health is a critical issue often neglected in public discourse, and unfortunately, it’s not a priority in the current politica...