Maldives, a middle income country, is on track to meet most of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), while gender gap requires attention. Maldives has made great progress in improving maternal health and has achieved MDG. The total fertility rate has declined to 2.3 in 2012. Contraceptive use...

Bhutan is a small landlocked country in the Himalayas between China and India. Poverty reduction has been rapid from about 23 percent in 2007 to 12-13 percent in 2012. Gender equality and women's empowerment are important determinants of reproductive health. Contraceptive prevalence rate (CPR)...

Adolescents around the world face tremendous challenges to meeting their sexual and reproductive health (SRH) needs. Inadequate access to health information and services, as well as inequitable gender norms, contribute to a lack of awareness about puberty, sexuality, and basic human rights that...

China has made great progress in improving maternal and child health (MCH). It reduced maternal deaths from 1,500 per 100,000 live births and over 200 infant deaths per 1,000 live births in 1949 to 120 per 100,000 live births and infant deaths to 42 per 1,000 by 1990. Currently China is on track...

Despite international support for adolescent and youth sexual and reproductive health (SRH) and rights (SRHR) (for example, the 1994 International Conference on Population in Development), young people consistently face high levels of unmet need for contraception, unplanned pregnancies, unsafe...

Nepal has achieved its targets for MDGs 4 and 5a. Maternal mortality declined from 790 to an estimated 190 deaths per 100,000 live births between 1990 and 2013 an impressive 76 percent decline. Under-five mortality showed a similarly impressive decline going from 142 to 42 deaths per 1,000...

Egypt is a lower-middle-income country with a GNI per capita (PPP) of US$ 5,654 in 2012. Since the Arab Spring, Egypt?s economic growth has slowed to 0.6 percent in 2012. Half of Egypt?s 82.54 million people live in rural areas. Poverty is concentrated in Upper Egypt (the southern region). As of...

Nigeria is the most populous country in sub-Saharan Africa. It also has a very young population. The majority of the population is below the age of 25 years, with 22 percent of the country?s population between the ages of 10-19 years. Data on sexual and reproductive health (SRH) outcomes in...

Malawi has made great progress in improving maternal and child health (MCH). Under-five mortality declined from 244 to 71 deaths per 1,000 live births between 1990 and 2012, and maternal mortality declined from 1,100 to 510 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births between 1990 and 2013. This note...

Today?s adolescents and youth face substantial physical, social, legal, and economic barriers to meeting their SRH potential. Key factors underlying these issues are a lack of adolescent SRH (ASRH) policies and access to accessible, affordable, and appropriate health services. The impact that...