The Lancet examines Indonesia’s efforts to reduce maternal mortality, one of the Millennium Development Goals President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has identified as a national priority. Indonesia’s risk of maternal death is one in 150, compared with one in 4,000 in developed nations, and the government has set a goal of reducing mortality to 102 for every 100,000 live births by 2015, one-quarter of the rate in 1990, according to the journal. Gita Maya Koemara Sakti, recently appointed as director of maternal health, explained the Ministry of Health “has adopted a four-step plan that starts with bolstered family planning campaigns,” the Lancet writes. Other efforts include providing free maternal health care through the national social assistance system, improving the national midwifery program, and providing more funding to rural health clinics, the journal notes. The Lancet includes quotes from other government officials and non-governmental organization representatives regarding these efforts and the challenges faced (Webster, 12/8).

Kangaroo Care Could Help Mothers In Poor Settings To Save Their Babies New York Times contributing writer Tina Rosen, on the newspaper’s “Opinionator” blog, examines the success of a system known as kangaroo care, which has helped to improve the survival rates of premature infants by using skin-to-skin contact with…

An online survey of men who have sex with men (MSM) and their health service providers shows that the majority of respondents said most “gay men worldwide don’t have access to HIV testing, counseling or free condoms and lubricant, a new study finds,” according to the Global Forum on MSM & HIV (MSMGF), HealthDay/Businessweek reports.

‘Complacency Is Dangerous’ In Global HIV/AIDS Fight: A Lancet Editorial is critical of UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibe’s statement in the annual UNAIDS report that “We have halted and begun to reverse the epidemic.” The editorial states, “These words, from the head of a U.N. agency, are reckless and premature, and…

Ahead of the final day of the International AIDS Conference-AIDS 2010 on Friday, a New York Times analysis piece reports that growing concerns over funding for HIV/AIDS have dominated the focus of the conference. According to the newspaper, this has affected “organizers’ efforts to get publicity for the Vienna Declaration, which calls for drug users to be spared arrest and offered clean needles, methadone and treatment if they have AIDS.”

To Improve Malaria Control, Remove Taxes On Medicines In a Wall Street Journal opinion piece, Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete, president of the United Republic of Tanzania, and Yoweri Museveni,  president of the Republic of Uganda, both of the African Leaders Malaria Alliance, write about ways to overcome barriers to malaria control and…

African leaders focused on the theme of the 15th African Union (AU) Summit on Sunday: maternal and infant mortality on the continent.

Afghan Government Tells Foreign Donors How Aid Should Be Spent “The Afghan government wants foreign donors to focus 80 percent of the billions of dollars flowing into the country on priority projects it believes are key to pulling the country out of poverty and turmoil, Afghan officials said,” the Associated…

American Abroad Media examines how religious groups and leaders are dealing with public health issues in Africa. The program consists of five segments.

More Nurses Could Help Address Global Health Woes “Almost every nation, regardless of its wealth and resources, faces a continuing shortage of nurses and an acute lack of nursing faculty available to educate more nurses. This dearth of practicing nurses and nurse educators is particularly critical in countries like Haiti…