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| Summary |
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Sexual and reproductive health is at the core of people's lives and well-being. As a key global player in its field, the UNDP/UNFPA/WHO/World Bank Special Programme of Research, Development and Research Training in Human Reproduction (HRP) investigates the extent and nature of sexual and reproductive health problems and finds ways of alleviating or solving them. While fertility regulation has remained a core area of HRP's work, its research agenda has expanded in recent years to include the entire spectrum of sexual and reproductive health.
Much of HRP's comparative advantage in the reproductive health community springs from the global research network it has built up. This report describes studies conceived and coordinated by HRP and carried out during the 2000-2001 biennium by research groups belonging to the HRP network. The work covers a wide range of reproductive health issues-the safety and effectiveness of existing, and the promise of new, family planning methods; how to make pregnancy and childbirth less life-threatening; preventing reproductive tract infections, including HIV infection; doing away with unsafe abortion; and, as the threat of HIV/AIDS looms ever-larger over the planet, how to make adolescent sexual behaviour less hazardous. The report introduces each issue with basic facts and an outline of the main questions that HRP-backed research sets out to answer.
Reproductive health care relies increasingly on sound scientific evidence for its effectiveness. This report reflects the work of a global programme dedicated to providing that evidence.
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