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Ipas is an international organization that works around the world to increase women's ability to exercise their sexual and reproductive rights, and to reduce abortion-related deaths and injuries. We believe that women everywhere must have the opportunity to determine their futures, care for their families and manage their fertility.

The global problem of unsafe abortion

Without access to comprehensive reproductive health care, women may face unwanted pregnancies and the risk of unsafe abortion. Every year, approximately 66,500 women die from the complications of unsafe abortion.

These women are daughters, sisters, wives and mothers. Most are very poor; many are very young. And each is so determined to end a pregnancy that is unwanted, mistimed or ill-advised that she will risk her life to do so. Many more women suffer serious, often permanent disabilities.

The social consequences of unsafe abortion extend far beyond the individual woman, to her family and to her community. Young children whose mothers die are far more likely to die themselves than children with living parents. And a mother's death is likely to have a negative impact on a child's growth rate.

Why Ipas cares... and why you should too

Deaths and injuries from unsafe abortion are especially heartbreaking because they are entirely preventable - yet those with the power to prevent them too often choose not to act. At Ipas, we believe that:

Every woman has a right to the highest attainable standard of health and to safe reproductive health choices, including safe abortion care.

No woman should have to risk her life, her health, her fertility, her well-being or the well-being of her family because she lacks safe reproductive health care.

Along with caring, committed health professionals and other colleagues worldwide, Ipas tackles this neglected public-health problem head-on in some of the world's poorest countries. While many international donors and governments have focused attention and resources elsewhere, we struggle against the fundamental social injustice that results in the deaths of so many women in the primes of their lives.