11 Facts About Women Around the World
- Every 90 seconds, one woman dies during pregnancy or
childbirth. Most of these deaths are preventable, but due to gender-based
discrimination many women are not given the proper education or care they
need.
- Reports show that violence against women increases during
pregnancy.
- Women make up 80 percent of all refugees and displaced
people. Instruments of genocide such as sexual violence and rape are often
directed at women and girls.
- Women are largely excluded from formal peace processes.
Only 1 in 13 participants of peace negotiations since 1992 were women.
- Women gained the right to vote in America less than 100
years ago in 1920..
- Women make up more than 50 percent of the global
population, but fill less than 20 percent of all parliamentary seats.
- More than 16.4 million women in the world have
HIV/AIDS. In some regions, girls are HIV-positive at a rate 5 times that
of boys.
- The majority of persons smuggled illegally across
country borders are women. Many of them are kidnapped or sold by their own
families into the sex industry.
- Women account for 70 percent of the population living
in absolute poverty (on less than $1.00 a day).
- 80 percent of victims of hand-held weapons in war are
women.
- Girls are actually less likely to reach adulthood
because of gender discrimination. Tens of millions of girls have been
aborted, killed, undernourished, or terribly neglected due to their
gender.