Challenges for Measuring Progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals.

With the adoption, in September 2015, of the Sustainable Development Goals with a time horizon of 2030, there is a dire need to exploit avenues for the monitoring of progress towards meeting the targets pertaining to sexual and reproductive health, whether at global, regional, national or grassroots level. The current process for the selection of indicators, to complement the targets, provides an opportunity for a concerted effort to improve monitoring procedures and ensure their relevance for programme adjustment and accountability. It is imperative for national processes to ensure effective reporting besides linkages with related sectors.

Sexual and Reproductive Health at 2015 and Beyond: A Global Perspective.

The International Conference on Population and Development and Millennium Development Goals propelled reproductive health into priorities for international development through declarations, statements, and frameworks. However, key indicators demonstrate that progress in both service provision and clinical outcomes has not been optimal, especially for certain disadvantaged groups. With the Sustainable Development Goals, efforts over the next two decades will focus on access to and quality of health services.

Fertility preferences and the need for contraception among women living with HIV: the basis for a joint action agenda.

Objectives: HIV-positive women have particular needs for contraception to avoid unwanted pregnancy, to protect their own health and to eliminate the risk of transmitting HIV to an infant. In 2004, the United Nations described a four-element strategy to preventing mother-to-child transmission of HIV; the second element is preventing unintended pregnancies among HIV-positive women. However, fertility preferences among HIV-positive women who know their status remain poorly understood.

Progress towards the Millennium Development Goals: a long trek for reproductive health.

With only six years remaining to achieve the Millennium Development Goals in 2015, issues pertaining to universal access to reproductive health deserve more emphasis as part of current efforts in international health. The maternal health goal is the Millennium Development Goal with the most disappointing progress. Whereas much has been achieved globally for the utilization of family planning services, there are some geographical areas and subpopulations where progress is lacking.

Targeting access to reproductive health: giving contraception more prominence and using indicators to monitor progress.

Unmet need for contraception represents a major failure in the provision of reproductive health services and reflects the extent of access to services for spacing and limiting births, which are also affected by personal, partner, community and health system factors. In the context of the Millennium Development Goals, family planning has been given insufficient attention compared to maternal health and the control of sexually transmitted infections. As this omission is being redressed, efforts should be directed towards ensuring that an indicator of unmet need is used as a measure of access to services.

The role of reproductive health for attainment of the millennium development goals.

Universal access to reproductive health services is a major aim of current efforts towards attaining the Millennium Development Goals, and reproductive rights and poverty reduction are crosscutting issues for this current focus of international development. Political statements should be complemented by financial commitments for mobilizing resources and the formulation of country-owned action plans. Upscaling services will necessitate strengthening health systems, integrating care, and building capacities.

Family planning: the unfinished agenda.

Promotion of family planning in countries with high birth rates has the potential to reduce poverty and hunger and avert 32% of all maternal deaths and nearly 10% of childhood deaths. It would also contribute substantially to women's empowerment, achievement of universal primary schooling, and long-term environmental sustainability. In the past 40 years, family-planning programmes have played a major part in raising the prevalence of contraceptive practice from less than 10% to 60% and reducing fertility in developing countries from six to about three births per woman.