Poverty, food security and universal access to sexual and reproductive health services: a call for cross-movement advocacy against neoliberal globalisation.

Universal access to sexual and reproductive health services is one of the goals of the International Conference on Population and Development of 1994. The Millennium Development Goals were intended above all to end poverty. Universal access to health and health services are among the goals being considered for the post-2015 agenda, replacing or augmenting the MDGs. Yet we are not only far from reaching any of these goals but also appear to have lost our way somewhere along the line. Poverty and lack of food security have, through their multiple linkages to health and access to health care, deterred progress towards universal access to health services, including for sexual and reproductive health needs. A more insidious influence is neoliberal globalisation. This paper describes neoliberal globalisation and the economic policies it has engendered, the ways in which it influences poverty and food security, and the often unequal impact it has had on women as compared to men. It explores the effects of neoliberal economic policies on health, health systems, and universal access to health care services, and the implications for access to sexual and reproductive health. To be an advocate for universal access to health and health care is to become an advocate against neoliberal globalisation.