Strengthening U.S. Investments in Women’s Global Health

U.S. policymakers and private-sector partners increasingly appreciate the importance of targeted U.S. investments in women’s health to achieve global health outcomes, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. With budgetary constraints worsening, progress in women’s health will require maximizing investments by engaging new partners, identifying program synergies, and aligning with countries’ national priorities to meet women’s needs. Such strategic coordination—involving maternal newborn and child health, voluntary family planning, and HIV and AIDS services—presents new opportunities to expand the impact of U.S. investments.

In March 2013, the CSIS Global Health Policy Center led a delegation to Zambia to examine the opportunities and challenges of strengthening U.S. policy approaches to women’s global health issues. CSIS chose to visit Zambia because of the new level of political will and leadership on women’s health issues in the country; women leaders, in particular, are in an exceptional position to drive forward country ownership, including Zambia’s first lady and other high-level government health officials. The CSIS delegation included CSIS staff, senior staff from four congressional offices, and a representative of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This is the latest in a series of delegations that CSIS has led to investigate U.S. global health policy in Africa, and it builds on an extensive body of work that CSIS has produced on women’s global health and U.S. policy.