Violence against women: a global health emergency.

The call for action "Violence Against Women: A Global Health Emergency" is part of the global Women's Access to Health Campaign (WAHC), originally launched on the International Day of Action for Women's Health (May 28) in 2003. The Women's Global Network for Reproductive Rights (WGNRR), in collaboration with the People's Health Movement (PHM), has issued this call for action because violence against women continues to be a human rights and public health emergency worldwide. It causes mental and physical injuries, exposes women and girls to diseases and forced pregnancy, increases women's vulnerability in all spheres of their lives and, in the worst cases, ends in women's deaths.

In the call for action, WGNRR emphasizes the responsibility of the public health sector to provide prevention and care based on the primary health care approach and to place women at the center. The public health sector and health workers in most countries give inadequate attention to women's needs in general and lack an understanding of violence against women in particular. Violence against women is a violation of human rights for which governments and their institutions must be held accountable.

* For more information, or to join the campaign, visit the Women's Global Network for Reproductive Rights at http://www.wgnrr.org