Many Haitian women have their blood pressure taken for the first time at mobile clinics like this one staffed by a Cuban medical brigade in Salomon market in Port-au-Prince.
Credit: Patricia Grogg/IPS

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Aug 28 2013 (IPS) – It s Saturday, and the entrance hall of a police station in front of the busy market in Salomon in the Haitian capital has become an improvised health post. In a few minutes there is a long queue of people waiting to be seen by the Cuban medical brigade.

The police officer on duty said he was not authorised to speak to journalists, but the extent of police cooperation is obvious. The police stations tables and chairs are quickly lined up…

Patients at a chemotherapy session in the Civil Hospital in the province of Cienfuegos, Cuba. Credit: Jorge Luis Baños/IPS

HAVANA, Nov 12 2013 (IPS) – The meagre budgets of Cuban families are put to the test when one of the members is diagnosed with cancer. Although treatment is free of cost, only extended networks of support help alleviate the economic impact of the disease, which is now the number one cause of death.

“The most expensive thing is the diet. We have to buy fruit, vegetables, chicken and fish, which are costly and hard to get,” said Adolfo (not his real name), who changed jobs four times in his efforts to help his wife through her 11-year battle w…

Bogotá is famous for its vast network of bike lanes. Credit: Helda Martínez/IPS

CARACAS, Dec 17 2013 (IPS) – “I ride 43 km a day and I love it,” said Carlos Cantor in Bogotá, Colombia. “Five years ago I switched my car for a bike,” explained Tomás Fuenzalida from Santiago, Chile.

They are both part of the burgeoning growth of cycling as a transport solution in Latin America.

But in the second-most urbanised region in the world, public sentiment towards bicycles is mixed, with some seeing them as a symbol of low socioeconomic status, says the study by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) with regard to the expansion of this sustainable me…

Ready for the wedding night? Credit: Courtesy of David Trilling/EurasiaNet

BISHKEK, Feb 27 2014 – It starts out like any gymnastics class: A teacher guides a roomful of women through stretching and breathing exercises. The yoga, ballet and tai chi moves train pelvic muscles, the stomach and legs.

You only realize you are in a “sex class” when the egg-shaped stones appear. They are used for vaginal weightlifting, a Chinese technique for strengthening muscles and increasing sensitivity in the genital area. The goal is something rarely discussed in Kyrgyzstan: better sex.“After the fall of the Soviet Union, sex hit Kyrgyzstan like a hammer. People were not ready.” — Bu…

The global drawdown in the use of leaded fuel has resulted in benefits of some 2.5 trillion dollars a year. Credit: Bigstock

WASHINGTON, Apr 22 2014 (IPS) – Consumer advocates, public health workers and environmental groups here are calling on the federal government to take a formal step towards regulating the use of lead in aviation gasoline, despite a failure to do so for nearly two decades.

The United States is one of the few countries that continue to allow the use of lead in aviation gasoline, known as “avgas” and used in more than 150,000 small planes and helicopters at around 20,000 U.S. airports. Avgas is now the country’s largest source of lead in a…

The richest 66 people have the same amount of wealth as the bottom half of humanity. Credit: Bigstock/IPS

NEW YORK, Jun 17 2014 (IPS) – Two major injustices – inequality and climate change – are threatening to undermine the efforts of millions of people to escape poverty and hunger.

By concentrating wealth and power in the hands of a few, inequality robs the poorest people of the support they need to improve their lives. And as climate change devastates crops and livelihoods, it undoes poor people’s efforts to feed their families.

But an historic opportunity is on the horizon as the sun sets on the (MDGs). Right now the United Nations is i…

Doris Peltier, Aboriginal Women and Leadership Coordinator with CAAN, was diagnosed with AIDS at the age of 44. Credit: Neena Bhandari/IPS

SYDNEY, Jul 21 2014 (IPS) – Marama Pala, hailing from Waikanae on the west coast of the North Island of New Zealand, was diagnosed with HIV at 22. The news of her diagnosis spread like wildfire in her tight-knit Maori community.

That was in 1993 but even today, she says, there is a “shame and blame” attitude surrounding HIV, which disproportionately impacts the region’s indigenous population.

“If you are HIV positive, you are seen as ‘dirty’, as someone who must be a drug user or a prostitute. Our people are not se…

Rukia (in the foreground) recovers after a successful fistula operation at Malalai Maternity Hospital in Kabul (August 2014). Credit: Karlos Zurutuza/IPS

KABUL, Sep 2 2014 (IPS) – The smell of faeces and urine isolates them completely. Their husbands abandon them and they become stigmatised forever” – Dr Pashtoon Kohistani barely needs two lines to sum up the drama of those women affected by obstetric fistula.

Alongside the health centre in Badakhshan – 290 km northeast of Kabul – Malalai Maternity Hospital is the only health centre in Afghanistan with a sect…

Of the tens of thousands of chemicals thought to be in regular use in the United States today, the government’s main labour regulator oversees fewer than 500. Credit: Bigstock

WASHINGTON, Oct 22 2014 (IPS) – The U.S. government will soon begin receiving public suggestions on how federal regulators should update their oversight of toxic chemicals in the workplace.

The new , which began last week and will continue for the next six months, could result in the first major overhaul of related regulations in more than four decades. Of the tens of thousands of chemicals thought to be in regular use in the United States today, the government’s main labour regulator overse…

Teenage pregnancy affects 1.4 million Filipino girls aged 15 to 19. Credit: Stella Estremera/IPS

MANILA, Dec 15 2014 (IPS) – Mae Baez sees some of the darkest sides of communications technology.

A child rights advocate with the secretariat of the Philippine NGO Coalition on the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Baez says, “Teenage pregnancies continue to rise, street children are treated like criminals who are punished, children in conflict with the law and those affected by disasters are not taken care of, and now, with the prevalence of child porn, children know how to video call. “The government has not intervened in protecting children from early mar…