Bhubaneswar: The state government has decided to add Reproductive Health (RH) service component to Disaster Response and Disaster Mitigation Plan at the state and district levels. This was decided at a joint advocacy meeting presided over by Development Commissioner Rabi Narayan Senapati at the State secretariat here on Tuesday.

Better care has cut the number of women dying in pregnancy and childbirth by nearly half in the past two decades, but there is still a death every two minutes, according to UN figures released yesterday.

India and Nigeria between them accounted for one third of the 287,000 deaths of pregnant women in 2010 and Africa accounts for 36 of the 40 countries with the highest maternal deaths.

But health experts hailed the 47% fall in fatalities from 543,000 in 1990, and said the strategy for saving more lives was clear.

India and Nigeria together accounted for a third of the deaths of pregnant women globally in 2010, latest UN figures said, even as maternal deaths declined by nearly half in the past two decades due to improvement in health systems and increased female education.

Globally, an estimated 287,000 women died in pregnancy and childbirth in 2010, a decline of 47 per cent from levels in 1990, with sub-Saharan Africa and southern Asia accounting for 85 per cent of the those maternal deaths, according to a report on trends in maternal mortality between 1990 to 2010 released by UN Population Fund (UNFPA), World Health Organisation, UN Children’s Fund and the World Bank.

:United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA) would provide Bangladesh with 70 million US dollars for the next five years for the maternal health and family planning activities, an UNFPA official said in Dhaka on Tuesday.

Thirty years after the first reported case of human infection with the HIV virus, the profile of HIV/AIDS is undergoing a transformation from a life-threatening emergency to a manageable chronic disease. New strategies and initiatives have ensured that fewer people are getting infected with the virus, and more infected people are getting treatment and living longer. On World AIDS Day 2011, WHO urges countries in South-East Asia to focus on eliminating the disease, particularly in children, by 2015.

The world's population of seven billion is set to rise to at least 10 billion by 2100, but could top 15 billion if birth rates are just slightly higher than expected, the United Nations said on Wednesday.

In a report ahead of ceremonies on October 31 to mark the seven billionth human alive today, the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) warned demographic pressure posed mighty challenges for easing poverty and conserving the environment.

: Pakistan’s population will reach 210 million in the next nine years by 2020 – a situation that will burden its limited resources making it difficult for them to meet the requirements of additional people.

According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the world population will surpass 7 billion ‘milestone’ on Monday and despite major decline in the average of children per woman, the population will continue to swell at least till the middle of the 21st century.

The world’s population will reach the seven billion mark on October 31 and with the increase in population, Sri Lanka too will face a number of challenges, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) said today.

UNFPA sources said Sri Lanka would have to face a number of socio-economic challenges with the increasing population such as rising unemployment, the need to increase access to information on reproductive health and an increase in educational opportunities.

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) announced on Tuesday that it would activate life-saving activities in the flood-affected areas of Sindh, particularly for the pregnant women there.

About 1.4 million women of child-bearing age in the most severely affected districts of Badin, Tando Mohammad Khan, Tando Allahyar, Nawabshah, Mirpurkhas, Khairpur, Sanghar and Umerkot require access to reproductive health services, the UN agency says in a press release. Of them, over 160,000 women require emergency services.

The world's population will surge to seven billion next month and the challenge is not a lack of living space but how to empower disenfranchised women and girls, the United Nations said Tuesday. The UN Population Fund (UNFPA), launching a movement called "7 billion Actions," said the milestone was an opportunity to break the cycle of poverty and health crises in nations where huge gender inequalities exist.