Ipas (organization)


Around the world, about 44,000 women and young girls die, and millions of others live with serious injuries, due to unsafe abortion practices.[1] Ipas is an international, nongovernmental organization whose sole focus it to work towards increasing access to safe abortions and contraception.[2] The organization works by training partners in Africa, Asia and Latin America on how to provide and advocate for safe and legal abortions, and provide women with information so that they can access these services.[3]

Ipas
Founded1973
TypeNonprofit 501(c)(3)
Location
  • North Carolina
Area served
Worldwide
Websitewww.ipas.org
Official Logo for Ipas, Sexual & Reproductive rights organisation

Ipas Strategies

Ipas states that laws and policies hinders women and girls ability to create their own futures along with the access to Safe, legal abortions and contraception.[4]

Ensure Safe Care

Ipas believes that Abortion and Contraception saves lives, therefore, Ipas emphasizes having trained abortion providers while supporting health systems to ensure there are safe abortions and contraception available to both women and girls.[5]

Put Women and Girls in Control

Ipas makes sure that they partner with organizations where women and girls can seek support and confidence when trying to access the rights to abortion and the right to obtain contraception.[6]

Organizational standards and cooperation

Ipas maintains transparency and efficiency as a standard of internal operations and governance.[7] Ipas works through a number of local and global partnerships to promote the organization's goal of safe, high quality contraception and abortion services.[8]

Areas of Focus

Ipas continues to focus on the ability for women and girls to access abortions and obtain contraceptive in a legal and safe manner, but in order to get such things legalized and accessible, Ipas will continue train providers, to strengthen healthcare providers, and engage with communities "to reduce barriers to safe abortion like stigma."[9] Some of Ipas' areas of focus include:

Reproductive Health Technologies

Ipas was originally founded as an abortion technology organization that focused on manual vacuum aspirator (MVA), which they plan on evolving over time all while making sure quality health products remain unchanged.

Understanding women's wants and needs

Ipas wants to focus on research targeted at understanding women's wants and needs in regards to their reproductive health.

Self- management of medical abortion

Ipas wishes to improve the ability for women to have some control when it comes to abortion; introducing the pill.

High-quality abortion care

There are poor indicators that measure the safety of abortion services, therefore Ipas continues to work with partners to ensure safe quality abortions

Care for Victims of Gender-based Violence

Ipas wishes to improve care of women and girls that experience gender-based violence and rape that result in unwanted pregnancies.

Sexuality Education

This includes abortion; Ipas wishes to partner with global, national and local institutions to advocate for education programs that include non-biased information on sexuality health and abortion.[10]

Global Gag Rule

Ipas is working to keep the Global Gag Rule, also known as Mexico City policy, out of third world countries by documenting the suffering it inflicts on women and girls around the world. This ruling makes it difficult for women to get safe and effective abortions in third world countries, sub-Saharan African countries are most effected by this.[11] At the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo former official with Ipas, Barbara Crane, spoke out against this policy,"We need stronger health systems and we need integrated service delivery. One of the problems is that family planning has often been kept separate from the problems is that family planning has often been kept separate from other health service delivery and verticalized, and abortion even more so. How do you break the cycle of unwanted pregnancy and unsafe abortion? You need to help women have access to services... All it [the global gag rule] does is marginalize women who have a clear and desperate need for these services and makes it harder for them to get access and it stigmatizes providers."[12] As of 2019 Ipas has reported that staff in Africa and Asia are reporting back that this policy is having a negative effect on local women to have safe abortions due to lack of information and funding.[13] Other problems in the Global South that have been reported by Ipas as of early 2019 are grantees are uneducated on this ruling and unknowingly accept which hinders their work on abortion, grantees are concluding their support with Ipas due to misunderstanding, and Bangladesh even stopped providing contraceptives which lead to stock-outs in some private facilities.[14]

Ipas’s work began in 1973, with the provision of life-saving reproductive health technologies for health systems in several countries. Since then, the organization has experienced significant growth and change, but its singular commitment to expanding women’s and girls’ access to safe, legal abortion has remained constant.

Today Ipas has offices on four continents. To meet the reproductive health needs of women and girls, Ipas focuses on improving health services, increasing access to services, and expanding the sexual and reproductive rights of women and girls. In addition, Ipas trains health workers and conducts research to ensure high-quality, evidence-based care is available.

History

Ipas was founded in 1973 to provide different country's health systems with life-saving technologies to aid in the reform of reproductive health services.[15] Ipas has changed and grown since its founding, however the organization remains committed to advocating for and providing women with access to safe and legal abortions.[16]

In 2000, Ipas began its work in India by bringing comprehensive abortion care (CAC), to provide women with safe abortions.[17] Since Ipas' work began, the Indian government has included CAC under their National Health Mission, leading to safer abortion laws in India.

In 2016, Ipas and the Guttmacher Institute worked together to convene a convention on abortion research, focusing on the causes and outcomes of unsafe abortion practices, specifically in Sub-Saharan Africa.[18]

Starting in 2017, Ipas has made a commitment to donate $10 million to family-planning services annually.[19]

Organizations Under Ipas
  • inroads[20]
  • Ipas Development Foundation (IDF)[21]

References
  1. "Ipas | Health. Access. Rights". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  2. "Ipas | Health. Access. Rights". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  3. "Ipas | Health. Access. Rights". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  4. "Our Strategy". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  5. "Our Strategy". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  6. "Our Strategy". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  7. "Our Strategy". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  8. "Our Strategy". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  9. "Our Strategy". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  10. "Our Strategy". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  11. "The Global Gag Rule". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  12. Rodgers, Yana van der Meulen (2018-11-23). The Global Gag Rule and Women's Reproductive Health: Rhetoric Versus Reality. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780190876128.
  13. "Ipas warns U.S. government on harmful impact of Global Gag Rule". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  14. "Ipas warns U.S. government on harmful impact of Global Gag Rule". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  15. "Ipas | Health. Access. Rights". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  16. "Ipas | Health. Access. Rights". www.ipas.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  17. "The IDF Story". www.ipasdevelopmentfoundation.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  18. "Ipas". Guttmacher Institute. 2016-03-09. Retrieved 2019-11-04.
  19. "Ipas | Family Planning 2020". www.familyplanning2020.org. Retrieved 2019-10-28.
  20. "inroads". endabortionstigma.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
  21. "Ipas Development Foundation". www.ipasdevelopmentfoundation.org. Retrieved 2019-10-18.
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