Resources

Most Americans consume three to four times more protein, primarily from meat, than is recommended for healthy living.  And eating less red meat – especially red meat - can improve both your health and the health of the environment. These are some of the key messages on the new Meat Eater's Guide to Climate Change + Health created by the U.S. based Environmental Working Group.

The EWG has created the Meat Eater's Guide to Climate Change + Health – to offer key information to help people make smart choices about food.

Click here to check out EWG's shopper's guide.

Join the Breast Cancer Fund in kicking the can this July! They want to send a message to canned food manufacturers that people want safe, BPA-free canned food. They ask pledge to sign the pledge to avoid canned foods now through July 31. Choose fresh, frozen or dried, but keep that can opener out of sight.

Most canned food companies continue to use BPA, an estrogenic chemical linked to breast cancer, to line their metal cans. Research shows that BPA migrates from the can lining into our food and then into our bodies. The result is that 93 percent of Americans have BPA in them.

Kicking the can isn't just about what you put in your shopping cart this month. The Breast Cancer Fund also wants canned food companies to hear loud and clear that an estrogenic chemical doesn't belong in food in the first place. They'll be delivering pledge signatures to the top canned food manufacturers to show them that thousands of people want BPA off their dinner plates. It's part of the Breast Cancer Fund's continued escalation to get BPA out of food and out of people.

Would you like to foster discussion of your community's issues? Are you looking for a way to make a difference in women's poverty, food security and health? Could you energize your own community-based research by applying the popular PhotoVoice message?

Based on lessons learned over a decade of Canadian community-based research, Prairie Women's Health Centre of Excellence is offering its step by step PhotoVoice guide to teach others how to bring together small groups of women to capture their stories. See previous exhibits.

After training from a professional photographer, women use a disposable camera to take pictures that represent their experiences of living in poverty, and the policies and programs they would like to change or keep.
The women meet to share their pictures and talk about what the photos mean to them. Their powerful images can be showcased in public showings, to broaden awareness of the realities of living in poverty and stimulate action for just social and economic policies to improve women's lives.

Order your PhotoVoice Manual for $12 using the online form or phone (204) 982-6630.

This new report from the United Nations Population Fund  "....confirms the critical role midwives play in improving maternal and newborn health and survival” according to the press release. It highlights the shortage of skilled midwives in many low-income countries, stressing the need to train and deploy more midwives in all parts of a country - especially remote and rural areas.”

The report contains information and data gathered from 58 countries in all regions of the world and confirms that the world lacks approximately 350,000 skilled midwives -- 112,000 in the neediest 38 countries surveyed -- to fully meet the needs of women around the world. The report explores the issues related to building up this key health workforce.

For more on this report, and to download it, visit the United Nations Population Fund.

Manitoba has released a new Women’s Health Strategy. The initial Manitoba Women’s Health Strategy was developed in 2000-2001 to provide a foundation on which to build a new approach to women’s health. That strategy identified specific goals and projects which laid out a roadmap for government initiatives in the years that followed.

In 2009, the departments of Manitoba Health (MH) and Manitoba Healthy Living, Youth and Seniors (HLYS) partnered with Manitoba Status of Women to revisit the Women’s Health Strategy. MH and HLYS also contracted the Women’s Health Clinic, who participated in the original strategy, to assist in gathering information through a series of 10 regional consultations.

The results of those consultations have been used to inform this renewed strategy.

The strategy can be found on the Manitoba government website.

Echo and its partners in Ontario have released Ontario’s first Women’s Health Framework, which sets out recommendations aimed at improving and maximizing the health of all women in the province.

Read the media release

Read the Ontario Women’s Health Framework

Read the associated backgrounder “The Current State – What is known about Women’s Health in Ontario”

Echo has released their research reports on access to abortion services in Ontario, along with recommendations from an expert panel for improving access to high quality, abortion services in Ontario.
These four new studies are a follow up to the abortion studies conducted 10 years ago. The four case scenarios include: availability of first trimester abortions in Ontario; complication rates, practices and procedures among Ontario hospital abortion providers; availability and safety of second trimester abortions in Ontario; and abortion curriculum and abortion training in Ontario Medical Schools.  

Read more on ECHO’s website.

World Health Organization 2011

This new WHO Gender Mainstreaming Manual for Health Managers is a user-friendly guide aimed to raise awareness and develop skills on gender analysis and gender responsive planning in health sector activities.  The Manual is conceptually structured to move from awareness to action throughout a three to four day workshop to reduce gender-based inequities in health.

Download the Facilitators' Guide
Download the Participant Notes

Women’s Health in Women’s Hands and Dr. Charmaine Williams, (Factor‐Inwentash School of Social Work, U of T) have released the findings of “Every Woman Matters” a primary health care research project focusing on the health issues and needs of Black Women and Women of Colour.  Read the report.

Chapter 11: HIV Infection is by Bayoumi AM, Degani N, Remis RS, Walmsley SL, Millson P, Loutfy M, Daly T, Nelson LE, Gardner S, Challacombe L, Mishra S, Bierman AS.

POWER Study (Project for an Ontario Women's Health Evidence-based Report) is producing a comprehensive Women's Health Report to serve as an evidence-based tool for policy makers, providers and consumers in their efforts to improve health and reduce health inequities among the women and men of Ontario. The POWER Study HIV infection chapter reports on indicators related to HIV infection including sections on incidence, prevalence and risk behaviours; community services for HIV; clinical care and HIV outcomes. This chapter provides critical information on patterns of care for women and men in Ontario, and how they vary by socioeconomic, demographic, HIV exposure category and regional characteristics.

HIV prevention and care is complex and directly influenced by stigma, marginalization and the social determinants of health. By painting a picture of inequities in health and health care in the province, opportunities for improvement are identified and objective evidence is presented to inform priority setting and to provide a baseline from which to measure progress.

Visit their website to download a copy of the full chapter or the highlights document (which outlines the chapter's key findings and messages)

The HIV Infection Chapter Highlights document is also available in French.

Visit the POWER Study website to download all chapters and highlights documents.