recently given birth or are breastfeeding from
harmful environmental and occupational hazards,
and their children;
sensitive approaches to prevention, treatment and
rehabilitation, including those specifically designed
for pregnant women;
(d) Design, implement and strengthen prevention
(d) Provide full and accurate information about envi-
programmes aimed at reducing tobacco use by
women and girls; investigate the exploitation and
targeting of young women by the tobacco industry;
support action to prohibit tobacco advertising and
access by minors to tobacco products; and support smoke free spaces, gender-sensitive cessation
programmes, and product labelling to warn of
the dangers of tobacco use, noting the Tobacco
Free Initiative proposed by the World Health
Organization in July 1998;
ronmental health risks to the public, in particular
to women, and take steps to ensure access to clean
water, adequate sanitation and clean air.
6. P
olicy development, research, training and
evaluation
(a) Advance a comprehensive interdisciplinary and
collaborative research agenda on women’s health
which encompasses the entire life span of all
women, including women from special and diverse
groups within populations;
(e) Promote equitable sharing of household and family
responsibilities between women and men, and provide social support systems, where appropriate, to
help women who, as a result of their multiple roles in
the family, often may suffer from fatigue and stress;
(b) Establish concrete accountability mechanisms at
the national level for reporting on the implementation of the health and other related critical areas of
the Platform for Action;
(f) Support research on the relationship between
women’s and girls’ physical and mental health, self
esteem and the extent to which women of all ages
are valued in their societies to address issues such
as substance abuse and eating disorders.
(c) Improve the collection, use and dissemination of
data disaggregated by sex and age, and research
findings, and develop collection methodologies
that capture the differences between women’s and
men’s life experiences, including through the use
and, where necessary, further coordinated development of gender specific qualitative and quantitative health indicators that go beyond morbidity,
mortality and social indicators, capturing quality of
life, social as well as mental well being of women
and girls;
5. Occupational and environmental health
(a) Support for gender specific research on the
short- and long term effects of the occupational and
environmental health risks of work, including work in
the formal and informal sector, performed by both
women and men, and take effective legal and other
measures to reduce these risks, including risks in the
workplace, in the environment and from harmful
chemicals, including pesticides, radiation, toxic waste
and other such hazards that affect women’s health;
(d) Promote research on the interrelationship between
poverty, ageing and gender;
(e) Ensure participation of women at all levels in the
planning, implementation and evaluation of health
programmes; ensure also a gender perspective in
the health sector at all levels, including through the
elaboration of gender and age sensitive health policies and budgets, and the creation of an enabling
environment supported by a legislative framework
and monitoring, follow up and evaluation mechanisms within individual countries;
(b) Protect the health of women workers in all sectors,
including agricultural and domestic household
workers, through effective environmental and occupational health policies for gender sensitive work
environments, free from sexual harassment and
discrimination, which are safe and ergonomically
designed to prevent occupational hazards;
(c) Take specific measures to protect the health
(f) Mainstream a gender perspective into the curricula
of women workers who are pregnant or have
as well as the training of all health-care and service
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