Seven governments adopt statement on violence against women and girls at 66th World Health Assembly

On 21 May, around 200 World Health Assembly participants joined an early-morning side event on “Violence against women: health impacts and role of the health sector”. The event was organized by Belgium, India, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, the USA, and Zambia, with support from the WHO Departments of Violence and Injury Prevention and Disability; Reproductive Health and Research; and Emergency Risk Management and Humanitarian Response. A concluding statement, read on behalf of the panellists by Ms Kathleen Sebelius, US Secretary of Health and Human Services, affirmed their collective commitment to addressing interpersonal violence through further strengthening WHO's capacity to address this important health issue, particularly for women and girls, and to propose an agenda item for the 67th World Health Assembly.

• More information on the event
• Violence against women: infographic

More than 270 000 pedestrians lose their lives on the world’s roads each year accounting for 22% of the total 1.24 million road traffic deaths. WHO is calling on governments to take concrete actions to improve the safety of pedestrians. Under the banner “Make Walking Safe”, the Second United Nations Global Road Safety Week (6-12 May) kicks off worldwide. With events registered in around 100 countries, the Week seeks to draw attention to the needs of pedestrians; generate action on measures to protect them; and contribute to achieving the goal of the Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020 to save 5 million lives.

• Second UN Global Road Safety Week

The Global status report on road safety 2013 serves as a baseline for the Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020, declared by the UN General Assembly. The report presents information on road safety from 182 countries, accounting for almost 99% of the world’s population. It indicates that worldwide the total number of road traffic deaths remains unacceptably high at 1.24 million per year, legislation and enforcement are still inadequate, and pedestrians and cyclists need to be better protected. Made possible through funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies, this is the second in a series of Global status reports.

• Global status report on road safety 2013

VIP short courses are a series of complete training resources addressing a range of injury and violence prevention topics. Each course provides all the materials a facilitator requires to conduct a 2-5 day training. Visit the links below for the latest VIP short courses on child injury prevention and data collection.

• Child injury prevention course
• Data collection course