T he " Third World " – the division of humanity into haves and have-nots – was shaped by fatal interactions between world climate and world economy at the end of the nineteenth century. Three waves of drought, famine and disease devastated agriculture throughout the tropics and northern China when the monsoons failed. The total human toll could not have been less than 30 million victims. Fifty ...

Abortion is a fact in the lives of many women. Approximately 20% of American women of childbearing age have already had an abortion, and it is estimated that one out of three American women will have had one by age 45.1 Robinson and colleagues authored a review article entitled “Is there an abortion trauma syndrome? Critiquing the evidence?” (2008)2 that exemplifies the American Psychiatric Ass...

One way of addressing ethical issues in reproductive health is to look at the consequences of current laws, policies and practices and see whether the existing situation gives rise to a preponderance of good or bad consequences. If the bad consequences outweigh the good ones, there is an ethical obligation to seek to change the laws, policies or practices. The data on maternal mortality and mor...

1 Judd LL, Akiskal HS, Maser JD, et al. A prospective 12-year study of subsyndromal and syndromal depressive symptoms in unipolar major depressive disorders. Arch Gen Psychiatry 1998; 55: 694–700. 2 National Institute for Clinical Excellence. Depression: management of depression in primary and secondary care, clinical guideline 23. December, 2004: http://www.nice.org.uk/page.aspx?o=cg023 (acces...

Over the last 30 years, conservative power in the United States, financed and organized by Christian fundamentalist sects, the Catholic Church, and conservative corporate and political leadership, has become more threatening and potentially destabilizing of progressive democratic principles and practices. Powerful interlocking political, financial and social forces are arrayed against women in ...

The debate in which we now partake--over the use of animals in medical research--is one of the less remarkable of the social debates of this century. It is not distinguished by its intellectual strength, by its pragmatism, by its achievements, nor by its promise. Its two remarkable features are its longevity and its obstinate sterility. To antivivisectionists it has been a century-long struggle...

Remedies and reparation measures emerging from the Inter-American System of Human Rights in reproductive health cases have consistently highlighted the need to develop, and subsequently implement, non-repetition remedies that protect, promote, and fulfill women's reproductive health rights. Litigation outcomes that determine there have been violations of reproductive rights are regarded as a "w...