In early April Melinda French Gates, co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, launched a major effort by the foundation to help end the global shortage of contraceptives, which she called “a life-and-death crisis.” Speaking April 5 at a TEDxChange event, Gates said contraception is “a totally uncontroversial idea which unfortunately has become incredibly controversial.” She said “side issues” have almost taken birth control off the global health agenda and the victims of this paralysis are the people of sub-Saharan Africa and the poorest parts of South Asia. As a result some 100,000 women who do not want to be pregnant die in childbirth, while 600,000 more such women give birth to babies who die in their first month.

“This is a life-and-death crisis,” she told the event, which featured 194 simultaneous satellite events in more than 60 countries. “Somewhere along the line we got confused by our own conversations and we stopped trying to save these lives.” While contraceptive use is 66 percent or higher in most industrialized countries, it is 2 to 12 percent in many poor nations where supplies are lacking and mortality rates are highest, Gates continued.

Universal access to “the modern birth control methods that women want” would also empower parents to “bring every good thing to all our children,” she added. In a study of 180,000 people in Bangladesh, she said, villages given easy access to contraceptives and education about them for 20 years were healthier and wealthier than villages without such access.

“These trends start with individual families making decisions about what is best for their children, and they end as sweeping regional and national changes,” Gates said.

The Gates Foundation described the speech as the launch event for “a major push for the foundation around the critical role family planning plays in advancing women’s health and ensuring that women are empowered to decide when and if to have children.” Gates helps set the overall direction of the foundation, shaping strategies, reviewing results, and advocating for the foundation’s issues.