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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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,…

Nearly every maternal death is preventable, and the clinical expertise and technology necessary to avert these losses have existed for decades. Credit: Patrick Burnett/IPS

MADRID, Mar 7 2023 (IPS) – The answer is that there are alarming setbacks for maternal health care and, in many cases, even a total lack of maternity services, which threaten to further raise the number of these tragic preventable deaths one million or more a year by 2030.

Severe bleeding, high blood pressure, pregnancy-relate…

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres addresses the 22nd session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues at the General Assembly Hall of the United Nations headquarters in New York City on 17 April 2023. Credit: Ed Jones/AFP via Getty Images

NEW YORK, Sep 7 2023 (IPS) – This September, world leaders and public policy advocates from around the world will descend on New York for the . Alongside conversations on peace and security, global development and climate change, progress – or the lack of it – on the (SDGs) is expected to take centre-stage. A major will be held on 18 and 19 September. The UN hopes that it will serve as a �…

A health worker in Gaza continues with an inoculation campaign. The Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition has called for international action to end violence against or obstruction of health care in conflicts. Credit: UNWRA/Twitter

BRATISLAVA, May 22 2024 (IPS) – Governments and international agencies must do more to end impunity for violence against healthcare, campaigners have urged, as a new report shows that attacks on healthca…

KUALA LUMPUR, Jul 30 2020 (IPS) – Covid-19 threatens economic life the world over. The most urgent and important need is for governments, businesses and families to survive. Governments must revive economies and livelihoods to prevent Covid-19 recessions from becoming protracted depressions.

The Covid-19 crisis is clearly a ‘black swan event’, threatening both public health and livelihoods. Both the pandemic and containment efforts are not due to business operations and decisions, but nonetheless have compelling consequences for them.

Jomo Kwame Sundaram

Covid-19 contagion contractionary, costly
In East Asia and a few other societies, successful early precau…