Bridging the Gaps Between Climate Action & Biodiversity Preservation

The following Oped is part of a series of articles to commemorate World Environment Day June 5

Sunrise in the Ebro Delta in Spain’s Catalonia region. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said last month there was a 40% chance of the watershed global warming mark being met during the time frame, and these odds are increasing with time. Credit: WMO/Agusti Descarrega Sola

KATHMANDU, Nepal, Jun 2 2021 (IPS) – With the climate negotiations getting more and more intense in the light of ensuring meaningful achievements in the upcoming COP- 26 summit in Edinburgh, an event that is key to move forward the pathway towards a net zero future started in Paris, this year on J…

Papua New Guinea Battles COVID-19 and Health Workers’ Vaccine Scepticism

Papua New Guinea (PNG), like many other Pacific Island countries, successfully held COVID-19 at bay last year, aided by early shutting of national borders. However, by March this year, the pandemic was surging in the most populous Pacific Island nation, and by July, it had reported 17,282 cases of the virus and 175 fatalities.

Logistic and communication challenges to rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine are immense in the rural and remote highlands region of Papua New Guinea. Credit: Catherine Wilson

CANBERRA, Australia , Jul 13 2021 (IPS) – Papua New Guinea (PNG), like many other Pacific Island countries, successfully held COVID-19 at bay last ye…

Internationally Trained Medical Doctors are Part of the Solution in Post-Covid-19 Canadian Healthcare System

Dr Shafi Bhuiyan with colleagues. He and his colleagues argue that COVID-19 has exposed gaps in the Canadian healthcare system.

Toronto, Canada, Sep 3 2021 (IPS) – Access to quality healthcare is a basic human right, but for many, especially those in vulnerable communities, the right is not fully realized.

The exposed this in the Canadian healthcare system.

While surgical backlogs and delayed appointments may be prominent features of the healthcare crisis, the indirect impacts of Covid-19 must be considered. These include a , such as cancer screenings, declining health among Indigenous and aging people and for those with chronic illnesses, as well as worseni…

Mental Health at a Cost, Inequality

World Mental Health Day was on October 10, 2021. The theme for this year was Mental Health in an unequal World . This is an appropriate focus given the extreme inequities to access to mental health services that exist in our society.

Women are nearly twice as likely as men to suffer from mental illness, including depression. Credit: Unsplash /Melanie Wasser.

Oct 11 2021 (IPS) – was on October 10, 2021. The theme for this year was Mental Health in an unequal World . This is an appropriate focus given the extreme that exist in our society.

We are three providers committed to mental health equity across the globe-in India, Uganda and the United States. While…

Social Distance, Science and Fantasy

STOCKHOLM / ROME, Dec 3 2021 (IPS) – In these times of COVID isolation, social distance get on the nerves of several of us and the effects may be long-lasting, even endemic. Many schoolchildren have interacted and still meet with their teachers through computer networks, while the same phenomenon applies to their contact with others. Technical devices are with an ever-increasing scope becoming an integral part of all communication, teaching, and entertainment, in short – of social interaction. When it comes to education, given all the poor and even harmful educators we are forced to encounter during our lifetime, mechanization of education might be perceived as a step…

Teleworking: All That Glitters Is Not Gold

Without proper planning, organization and health and safety support the impact of teleworking on the physical and mental health and social wellbeing of workers can be significant, warns new report. Credit: Martin/ILO

Without proper planning, organization and health and safety support the impact of teleworking on the physical and mental health and social wellbeing of workers can be significant, warns new report. Credit: Martin/ILO

MADRID, Feb 4 2022 (IPS) – Now it comes to teleworking, the double-edged, relatively recent phenomenon imposed by COVID-19 lockdowns. On the one hand, it improves work-life balance, opportunities for flexible working hours and physical activity, red…

Profound Effect of Covid Pandemic on Women and Girls in Asia-Pacific Documented

Joint Asian Population and Development Association (APDA) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) research documented the impact of the COVID-20 pandemic on women and girls. The research also found promising practices emerged during the pandemic. Credit: UNFPA

Tokyo, Mar 31 2022 (IPS) – Women and girls in the Asia-Pacific region were adversely impacted due to COVID-19 pandemic responses – with marginalized women and girls’ access to sexual and reproductive health rights (SRHR) and gender-based violence (GBV) services profoundly affected.

These were the findings of a study by the Asian Population and Development Association (APDA) and the United Nations Populati…

Youth Demand a Voice in Call-To-Action on Child Labour

Delegates at the Youth Forum at the 5th Global Conference on the Elimination of Child Labour in Durban, South Africa, demanded that all forums in the future include their participation. Credit: Cecilia Russell/IPS

Delegates at the Youth Forum at the 5th Global Conference on the Elimination of Child Labour in Durban, South Africa, demanded that all forums in the future include their participation. Credit: Cecilia Russell/IPS

Durban, May 20 2022 (IPS) – Ashley has vast work experience. She has laboured by the sweat of her brow in the blistering sun on the streets of Guatemala, in the open fields on farmlands and indoors, toiling for long hours to the hum of a sewing mac…

UN’s Education Summit: An Opportunity to Create a Bottom-Up Global Governance

Credit: United Nations

KATHMANDU, Nepal, Aug 10 2022 (IPS) – The upcoming summit on Education, part of the UN Secretary General’s ambitious agenda, can truly bring accountability and participation to the inevitably new ways education will be imparted in the future.

With scorching temperatures, uncontrolled flames and floods devastating our planet, millions of people are realizing that we are all going to pay a high price for climate inaction.

The current climate crisis is furthering compounding the other emergency that is still affecting all of us, a public health crisis fully exposed by the Covid pandemic.

Amid this gloomy scenario, the internat…

Three Truths to Address Sexual Exploitation, Abuse & Harassment in the UN

The UN Secretariat building in New York City. Credit: UN Photo/Manuel Elías

NEW YORK, Nov 15 2022 (IPS) – The U.S. Government has recently published Engagement Principles on Protection from Sexual Exploitation Abuse Sexual Harassment within International Organizations , and while any involvement from Member States is to be encouraged, these principles do not address the fundamental need for either deterrence or for accountability.

The concept of a “survivor-centred approach” sadly is an irrelevant sound bite to appease a political lobby. Post-incident care and support for the victim is not only admirable but very necessary but serves no deterrent purpose,…