Suchergebnisse

It is surprising that although the IPPF is 27 years old it has never previously had a meeting on this topic. On rational grounds, it is one of the first subjects at which it might have looked because many of the data we have discussed were available long ago. I remember reading about a Western doctor in Asia who saw the familiar scene of a mother with a young baby being suckled from one breast and an older child from the other breast but, in this case, the older one was also smoking a cigarette between sucks! Perhaps we need some kind of startling image like that to make us look closely at the role of lactation in fertility regulation.

As news of war and terror dominates the headlines, scientist Malcolm Potts and veteran journalist Thomas Hayden take a step back to explain it all. In the spirit of Guns, Germs and Steel, Sex and War asks the basic questions: Why is war so fundamental to our species? And what can we do about it? Malcolm Potts explores these questions from the frontlines, as a witness to war-torn countries around the world. As a scientist and obstetrician, Potts has worked with governments and aid organizations globally, and in the trenches with women who have been raped and brutalized in the course of war. Combining their own experience with scientific findings in primatology, genetics, and anthropology, Potts and Hayden explain war's pivotal position in the human experience and how men in particular evolved under conditions that favored gang behavior, rape, and organized aggression. Drawing on these new insights, they propose a rational plan for making warfare less frequent and less brutal in the future. Anyone interested in understanding human nature, warfare, and terrorism at their most fundamental levels will find Sex and War to be an illuminating work, and one that might change the way they see the world

SummarySouth Korea and Cuba are dissimilar in religion, economy, culture and attitudes toward premarital sexual relations. In 1960, Korea instituted a national family planning programme to combat rapid population growth. Cuba explicitly rejected Malthusian policies, but made family planning universally available in 1974 in response to health needs. Both countries have undergone rapid fertility declines and today have less than replacement level fertility. Both countries have also used a similar mixture of methods, including a high prevalence of female sterilisation. Abortion has played a major role in the fertility decline of both countries, rising in the first half of the fertility transition and then falling, although remaining a significant variable in the second half. It is concluded that access to contraception, voluntary sterilisation, and safe abortion has a direct impact on fertility and has been associated with a rapid fall in family size in two very different countries.