ASIA

The Population Council has conducted research, provides technical assistance, and supported local institutions in Asia for the past five decades.  Council staff members working in the region collaborate with social scientists, public health researchers from other Council offices as well as with local governmental and nongovernmental organizations.

Council offices are located in Dhaka, Bangladesh; Hanoi, Vietnam; and New Delhi, India. Staff members have also conducted research or provided technical assistance in Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, the Philippines, and Taiwan. Examples of current major projects include: 

Reproductive health 
Recent efforts in Asia have focused on implementing a client-centered, gender-sensitive approach to reproductive health. Around the region, Population Council researchers study strategies to make childbearing safer. They assess the provision of safe, legal abortion services and postabortion care. And they evaluate the needs of people in their post-reproductive years and examine gender-based violence. Researchers in Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, and the Philippines are exploring men's involvement in reproductive health services, especially those related to antenatal and postpartum care, family planning, and sexually transmitted infections.

Fertility transition and aging 
Social scientists at the Population Council are examining the transition from high to low fertility in East Asian countries, with particular attention to the distinctive political and administrative conditions that contributed to the fertility outcome and allowed its economic benefits to be realized. They are determining what aspects of this experience may be transferable to other settings.

Population aging is expected to be among the most prominent global demographic trends of the twenty-first century, and the Council is conducting aging research in Cambodia, China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, and Thailand. In Thailand, Council social scientists have studied socioeconomic status and health among older people, and in Taiwan they have investigated cognitive impairment, use of services by the elderly, and trends in the health of older people.

Transitions to adulthood 
Population Council researchers are evaluating programs to assess the best ways to provide reproductive health services to adolescents. They also are investigating the feasibility and effectiveness of integrating vocational counseling and training for adolescent girls within a reproductive health program for urban slum dwellers in India.

In Bangladesh and India, the Council is tracking groups of first-time parents to understand the dynamics that surround this period in young people's lives. They also are examining the effects of girls' education on marriage and dowry practices in Bangladesh. In Myanmar, the Council is evaluating different models of providing reproductive health services to adolescents.

HIV/AIDS prevention and care 
The Population Council employs social science and public health research to improve responses to the HIV epidemic in Asia. This work is aimed at understanding the types of strategies that prevent HIV transmission, deliver care and support, and mitigate the effects of AIDS. Topics of research include:

• Preventing the trafficking of girls and women;
• Providing care and support for trafficked people;
• Scaling up care and support services for people living with HIV/AIDS;
• Facilitating community mobilization among sex workers to encourage the use of condoms and building skills for alternative income generation;
• Studying workplace HIV/AIDS programs;
• Evaluating the effect of HIV prevention programs in schools; and
• Increasing patient adherence to anti retroviral therapy.

Strengthening local resources
The Population Council has established a postdoctoral fellowship program in Vietnam to facilitate research on topics in reproductive health, health service systems, and poverty.

Council researchers are also providing technical assistance to facilitate the decentralization of reproductive health programs in Indonesia, developing a district model of reproductive health services in Laos, and undertaking national surveys and developing training curriculums in Myanmar.

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See Also

• Comparative Study of Aging and Health in Asia

• HIV and AIDS

• Reproductive Health

• Transitions to Adulthood

• Vietnam Fellowship Program

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This page updated 4 April 2006

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