Restoring U.S. global leadership on SRHR

Despite half a century of strong bipartisan U.S. government support for global family planning and reproductive health programs, the current US Administration has ushered in a new era of harmful measures – including the reinstatement and drastic expansion of the Global Gag Rule and proposals to slash the international family planning budget, including support for the UNFPA. Well-resourced, coordinated and strategic advocacy with the U.S. government is needed now more than ever to stop this corrosion of decades of progress on global reproductive health and to protect the health, rights, and lives of the most marginalized women and girls on the planet. The Universal Access Project (UAP) is the collaborative effort that has led that work for the last 10 years.

The year 2020 will be a pivotal time to restore and fortify U.S. government support for universal access to reproductive health with a changing of the U.S. political guard due to Congressional and Presidential elections. We will continue to need a coordinated group of expert advocates working day in and day out to simultaneously educate new members of Congress and potentially a new Administration; shore up existing Congressional champions; push back against misinformation and harmful policies; and hold policymakers to account.

We will work to 1) Safeguard U.S. funding for global family planning programs and stop harmful U.S. foreign policies that threaten access to family planning and reproductive rights globally; 2) Invest in the most effective advocacy groups holding the U.S. government to account on these issues; and 3) Engage media and strategic communications to strengthen public awareness and political will in support of U.S. global leadership on these issues.

Mode of engagement:

• Policy and guidance
  The UN Foundation's Universal Access Project will to restore U.S. global leadership on SRHR including funding and policy.