Development News

Gates Funds Women’s Health Research

The William H. Gates Foundation has awarded grants totaling $1,360,000 to Columbia School of Public Health (CSPH) for three international women’s health projects operated by the School’s Center for Population and Family Health (CPFH).

“Although levels of unwanted fertility have declined, the populations in greatest need of family planning services are often those that are most difficult to reach. Important reproductive health issues, such as high levels of maternal mortality and of sexually transmitted diseases, constitute major assaults to the health of women around the world. We are deeply grateful to The Gates Foundation for helping us to respond to these challenges,” said CSPH Dean Allan Rosenfield, M.D. in announcing the grants.

CPFH Director James McCarthy, Ph.D., explained that “among the populations in the world in greatest need of family planning and reproductive health services are people who have been forced, either by conflict or natural disaster, to flee their homes. Last year the United Nations estimated that 38 million people were in this situation with severely limited access to all health care, and particularly reproductive health care. Our new refugee program will work with international relief agencies in developing much-needed model programs.” The Foundation has provided $590,000 for the support of effective reproductive health services for refugees that will be developed by the Center’s Therese McGinn, M.P.H., and Roger Vaughan, Dr. P.H.

In addition to high death rates from HIV/AIDS, rural Ugandans have also been outside the reach of family planning and reproductive health programs. Building on its strong HIV prevention efforts in Uganda led by Maria Wawer, M.D., the Center will map out how to implement family planning services in the midst of an epidemic, recognizing that increasing the use of condoms to reduce exposure to HIV will simultaneously lower fertility. $160,000 has been allocated by the Foundation to augment the integration of family planning and HIV prevention in a rural Uganda setting.

The tragic number of women who die each year from pregnancy-related causes in developing countries has been reduced since the Center drew international attention to the problem in the 1980’s. Since then, the Center and colleagues in anglophone West Africa have developed and implemented model pilot programs with the goal of decreasing the numbers of maternal deaths. With $610,000 from the Gates Foundation, Deborah Maine, Dr.P.H., and McGinn will be able to work with networks of African institutions to extend these prevention efforts to East Africa and to francophone West Africa.

“We wish Columbia success in carrying out these projects,” said William H. Gates, Sr., director of the Foundation.

The William H. Gates Foundation was created in 1994 by Bill and Melinda Gates to support initiatives in areas that are of particular concern to them. Those broad fields include support for institutions of higher learning, local capital to campaigns, access to technology, and world health and population. in addition, the Gates’ have established the Gates Library Foundation, chartered to provide computer and internet access to patrons at public libraries in low income communities across the U.S. and Canada.

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