I met Cecil during a workshop and sharing session on women’s health that I led in rural India; at the end of the workshop, armed with new knowledge, she decided to try to stop the blaming and shaming of the women in her communities for giving birth to girls. For most of Cecil’s life, she …
One year ago I was on an all-female expedition to Antarctica aimed at heightening women's influence as decision-makers on issues that shape our planet. It wasn't long before I discovered I was the only African-born woman on the trip. The first thing I thought was: how did I get here and how can I use this experience …
I recently received a desperate call in the middle of the night from a doctor under my supervision at a hospital where I practice, informing me that a patient's uterus had ruptured (torn apart) during birth. The mother was referred to us because the hospital where she had delivered — about 100 km away — …
Mosquitoes are often described as the most dangerous animals on earth, because the diseases they transmit, including malaria, dengue and Zika, cause more than 1 million deaths annually. But strategies for mitigating these threats remain far from adequate. Consider malaria, which, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO), infected over 200 million people in 2017, …
A 15-year-old, Aisha*, and her 19-year-old husband, Kidanu*, had a dream to buy a house and maybe more cattle before they had children. In Ethiopia, there is intense social pressure on couples to prove their fertility right after marriage, but they were ready to wait because the world is changing. Resources such as land, pasture …