The Health-Care Professional Associations’ response to the Honoring Women’s Demands paper

In early 2022, the White Ribbon Alliance, in partnership with the International Stillbirth Alliance, Human Rights in Childbirth, National Birth Equity Collaborative and Fòs Feminista, summarized views expressed by over 1.2 million women and girls, through the What Women Want campaign, in a paper called Honoring Women’s Demands. The results were clear; women want to be treated with respect and dignity when receiving health care.

We sincerely thank women and girls for sharing their experiences and expressing their asks, which are critical to our efforts to ensure that universal quality health care reaches every woman, infant and child. As health care providers professionals, we are unified in our commitment to address these asks, and to put additional measures in place to provide all women, girls and gender-diverse people quality and respectful care at every interaction.

Our dedication to principles of respectful and quality care, are reflected in statements and principles adopted by our organizations. However, in practice, this does not always happen. Disrespectful and abusive practices are pervasive and unfortunately present in all countries,including in humanitarian settings.Such experiences can have direct negative impacts on the health and wellbeing of a care-seeker in the short- and long-term.

As Members of the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health (PMNCH) Health-Care Professional Associations (HCPAs) constituency we have outlined examples of some of the work already in progress, as well as additional steps we plan to take in response to each of the asks presented in the Honoring Women’s Demands paper. We also commit to reviewing the progress in these areas on an ongoing basis, to inform and adapt our efforts with an ultimate aim of providing respectful and quality care to every woman, girl and gender-diverse person, everywhere.