Tag: africa

Climate Change and Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights in Africa: The Urgent Need for Intersectional Approaches in Climate Change Policy and Governance

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

Photo credit: @wambuigichobi | SMA

A Masai woman raises her fist as other women leaders look on at COP 27 in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt during one of the debriefs by the Women and Gender Constituency. 

by Faith Lumonya, Esther Wambui, and Eunice Musiime

As global temperatures rise and the frequency of extreme weather events — such as floods, droughts, and heat waves — increases, climate change poses a growing threat to the progress of women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). Women face intersecting forms of vulnerability depending on their lived realities and experiences. For example, climate change reduces access to sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services, increases rates of sexual risk behavior, and leads to earlier sexual debut, higher prevalence of infectious diseases, and gender based sexual abuse and exploitation — however, these realities are not taken into account in climate change policy and governance.

Climate-related disasters frequently disrupt health care services, limiting women’s access to essential SRH care such as contraceptives and maternal health services. Associated economic and infrastructural damage further hamper access to vital health resources, while the increased instability exacerbates risks of gender-based violence and reproductive health challenges, especially for vulnerable women and girls. Given these compounded risks, it is crucial to integrate SRHR into broader global and national climate adaptation efforts. 

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Stethoscope on Ghana flag.

Dr. Eunice Brookman-Amissah: A Pioneer in Safe Abortion Law Reform

Joelle Boxer Leave a comment

By Joelle Boxer

Late last year, Dr. Eunice Brookman-Amissah won the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the “Alternative Nobel Prize,” for her pioneering efforts to improve safe abortion access in sub-Saharan Africa.

According to Dr. Brookman-Amissah, of the 36,000 deaths that occur globally due to unsafe abortion, almost 24,000 are in sub-Saharan Africa. “That was a totally unacceptable state of affairs,” she said, “given the fact that nobody, absolutely no woman has to die from a totally treatable and manageable cause.” Her advocacy work is credited with contributing to a 40% reduction in deaths from unsafe abortion in the region since 2000.

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3D illustration of a Renaissance marble statue of Zeus, king of the gods, who was also the god of the sky and thunder. Zeus in Greek mythology is known as Jupiter in Roman mythology.

Data Pseudonymization and POPIA

Donrich Thaldar Leave a comment

By Donrich Thaldar

Just as Zeus, the King of the Gods in Greek mythology, assumed various forms to conceal his true identity, so does modern data often undergo transformations to mask its origins. Zeus could become a swan, a bull, or even golden rain to achieve his purposes — all while maintaining his essence. Similarly, pseudonymization techniques aim to alter data enough to protect individual privacy without losing the core information necessary for research or analysis. This entails replacing data subjects’ identifying information in a dataset with unique codes, while keeping another dataset that links these data subjects’ identifying information with their allocated codes. Therefore, just as Zeus’ transformations were sometimes seen through by keen eyes, pseudonymized data can be re-identified by those having access to the linking dataset.

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Double exposure of abstract digital world map on laptop background.

Harmonizing Africa’s Data Governance: Challenges and Solutions

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By Donrich Thaldar

The establishment of a single data market across African nations promises significant socio-economic advantages, facilitating unrestricted and fluid data exchange. This concept has captured the attention of political leaders and has been prominently featured in the African Union’s (AU) Digital Transformation Strategy for Africa, as well as the AU’s Data Policy Framework. Further, entities like Smart Africa are actively championing the cause of creating an African single data market.

To transform the vision of an African single data market into reality, and to unlock its potential benefits for the continent’s populace, establishing regulatory alignment is paramount. This necessitates the integration of markets, the implementation of uniform online payment systems, the standardization of taxation and duties, and cross-border trade facilitation. This article delves into two critical legal dimensions of cross-border trade facilitation: data privacy and data ownership.

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United States Capitol Building - Washington, DC.

How Comparative Law Can Counter Threats to the ‘Most Successful Global Health Program in Modern History’

Joelle Boxer 2 Comments

By Joelle Boxer

PEPFAR, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, is under threat. Some members of Congress are withholding reauthorization support while arguing, without evidence, that PEPFAR funds abortion.

This is untrue: U.S. law prohibits PEPFAR from funding abortion. That alone should resolve the current impasse and secure the program’s reauthorization. Should bad faith opponents require further reassurance, however, they need look no further than the local legal realities of the 25 countries and 3 regions where PEPFAR operates.

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Bill of Health - Globe and vaccine, covid vaccine

Biotech Companies Are Opening Manufacturing Sites in Africa: Will This Help Vaccine Equity?

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By Sarah Gabriele

Two pharmaceutical giants of the pandemic, Moderna and BioNTech, are taking steps for increasing the manufacturing capacity for the COVID-19 vaccine in Africa. Last March, Moderna announced its plan to set up a manufacturing facility in Kenya to produce messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines, including COVID-19 shots. Similarly, in 2021, BioNTech started planning its own manufacturing plant in Africa, which will be composed of modular shipping containers.

Measures to address global vaccine inequity could not come sooner. As of December 15, 2022, only 34% of the population in Africa has received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, with Moderna and BioNTech having provided fewer doses compared to Oxford-AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson. After failing to successfully deliver vaccines equitably during the first two years of the pandemic, Moderna and BioNTech appear now to be taking steps to shoulder greater responsibility for vaccine equity.

However, if companies are ethically required to address the availability of vaccines, these well-intended efforts might still fail to fulfill their moral obligations. Indeed, while the construction of these new sites might sound like great news for fostering the delivery of vaccines in low- and middle-income countries, we should be aware that these manufacturing sites, as well as the existence of manufacturing capacity, might not be enough to achieve desired outcomes.

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globe.

June Medical Services and Access to Abortion: Comparative Lessons for the African Region

The Petrie-Flom Center Staff Leave a comment

By Charles Ngwena

Drawing lessons from June Medical Services provides the African human rights system with an opportunity not to affirm what it has in common with the U.S., but rather to uphold its own approach and articulate the jurisprudence that sets it apart.

The U.S. regulates abortion primarily through its Supreme Court using jurisprudence which frames abortion as a right implied in the constitutional right to privacy.

On the other side of the comparison, the African human rights system frames abortion as a human right that transcends national borders in the African region. By “human rights system,” I am referring to the regional system founded under the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (the African Charter) and its supplementary treaties, especially the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa (the Maputo Protocol).

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