The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA

Abstract #66222

Judy Norsigian, DHL, Executive Director, Our Bodies, Ourselves (formerly Boston Women's Health Collective), 34 Plympton Street, Boston, MA 02118, (617) 451-3666 x11, judy@bwhbc.org, Lisa L. Paine, CNM, DrPH, The Hutchinson Dyer Group, P.O. Box 380315, Cambridge, MA 02238, and Sally A. Tom, CNM, EDM, Nurse-Midwifery Specialty, University of Maryland School of Nursing, 655 West Lombard Street, Suite 575B, Baltimore, MD 21201.

Offered in the 30th anniversary year of the first commercial publication of the internationally acclaimed women’s health book, Our Bodies, Ourselves (OBOS), this session will explore key themes in social and political advocacy for women’s health. For three decades, OBOS has served as a catalyst for women's health activists in many organizations (including the APHA and the National Women's Health Network) to devise and adapt their approaches to key advocacy issue. Specific campaigns and actions addressing such topics as childbearing advocacy, midlife women's health concerns (including hormone therapy controversy), environmental issues, holistic approaches, contraception, abortion, sexually transmitted diseases, HIV/AIDS, and new reproductive/genetic technologies will be addressed in this session. Global social and political challenges posed by excessive medicalization, misleading drug industry advertising and promotion, distorted media coverage, racism and poverty will be explored in the context of current activism within the women's health movement worldwide. The session will address the importance of organizations and advocates strategically collaborating with one another, and examples of advocacy at all levels will illustrate the challenges and opportunities such collaborations present to advocates. Finally, the session will include specific examples of how the content of OBOS has been adapted in foreign translations/adaptations of the book, and how these adaptations influence plans for the upcoming revision. Additionally, the importance of an approach to the new revision that maximizes technology, allows for a rapidly expanding knowledge base, and includes a wide range of women, activists, policymakers, and providers in this process, will also be addressed.

Learning Objectives:

• Review the history of "Our Bodies, Ourselves" and its role in national and international women’s health movement.
• Discuss ways in which the women’s health movement has advanced global public health over the past 30 years.
• Assess how social and political advocacy for women’s health has evolved over the past 30 years.

Keywords: Women's Health, Advocacy

Related Web page: www.ourbodiesourselves.org

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: Our Bodies, Ourselves (Formerly Boston Women's Health Book Collective) 34 Plympton St. Boston, MA 02118 Judy Norsigian, Executive Director tel: 617-451-3666 x11 fax: 617-451-3664 No off label/investigative products
I have a significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.
Relationship: Employment