Women’s Empowerment and Gender Equity: Essential Goals for Saving Women’s Lives, World Health Organization (2008)

This fact sheet provides brief arguments making the link between women's empowerment and positive health outcomes for women and newborns. It identifies specific legal, policy, and sociocultural changes that increase gender equality and how each of these changes is vital to improve health outcomes for women. For example, it emphasizes increasing the health literacy of women, families, communities and enhancing the participation of women in health planning and establishing gender-responsive budgeting at the local, state, and national level as vital to improving women's health outcomes. Although the fact sheet focuses on developing countries, the gender equality issues and health outcomes describes are equally applicable to all societies.