To reach 'FP2020' goal, targets must be re-examined

Participants at the 2012 London Family Planning Summit "pledged $2.6 billion dollars in additional funding to achieve a worthy goal: provide 120 million new women who have 'unmet need' with family planning products and services by 2020 in 69 of the world's poorest countries," a movement dubbed "FP2020," Christopher Purdy, executive vice president of DKT International, writes in the Huffington Post's "Global Motherhood" blog. However, he says "an analysis of available data on a country-by-country basis suggests that a majority of the women with unmet need for family planning are in the world's middle-income countries." Purdy describes his data analysis, stating, "Given that significant unmet need continues to exist in middle-income countries, it seems fair to assume that we will be hard-pressed to reach 120 million new women unless we invest in these countries." He concludes, "Allocation of human and financial resources is underway but needs to be aligned with the realities of where the greatest chance for success can be achieved. It would appear that some re-orientation may be required to avoid falling short of FP2020's ambitious target seven years from now" (4/30).