This article was originally posted on The Atlantic on June 26, 2014.
Gains in women’s health in the past few decades have been extraordinary: maternal and child mortality rates have plummeted; access to family planning has increased; and clinical research includes women–and their special health concerns–in larger and larger numbers.
But there’s still work to be done. In a conversation entitled “Women’s Health: The Unfinished Revolution” at the Aspen Ideas Festival’s Spotlight: Health program, three experts joined prominent feminist writer and blogger Courtney E. Martin on stage to discuss the way forward.
Jane Otai, an Aspen New Voices Fellow and an advocate for women’s health and family planning in Kenya; Sisonke Msimang, another Aspen New Voices Fellow with experience as a feminist activist in post-apartheid South Africa; and Betty King, US Representative to the European Office of the UN and a central figure in the negotiations over the Millenium Development Goals, all agreed that making more progress in the women’s health field will require a series of deep cultural shifts in addition to a continuing commitment to policy-based interventions.
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