Bureaucratic systems are not set up to be what we refer to as human service organizations. They were established to collect revenue and maintain law and order and they used a law and order approach in providing family planning services.

If instead policy makers and program managers participate in an interdisciplinary assessment team, make informal visits to local families and have in-depth conversations with local providers and health authorities, the real needs and complex challenges of organizing good reproductive health services become apparent.The first country that implemented this participatory program of assessment, research and policy development was Brazil. I was one of the outsiders who provided support to the initiative.

the most important thing one can do for children is not accept the limitations they are so willing to impose on themselves.

It's very important in a leadership role not to place your ego at the foreground and not to judge everything in relationship to how your ego is fed.

Because in traditional Hindu culture menstruation is associated with a variety of social taboos, prolonged menstrual bleeding produced conflicts within families. The whole idea of fertility regulation was still extremely new in this setting and many husbands and other family members were angry when they found out that women had decided on their own to use the method and had gone to the clinic in secret.

It all started in India in the late 60s when I began helping my husband George, who was in the population field, evaluate the introduction of the intrauterine contraceptive device. At that time the IUD was considered to be the panacea for India's population problem. George's dissertation was focused on population and he became interested in the question of this new technology and how people were responding to it.

It is not enough to give money for demonstration projects. From the very beginning plans should be made for the scaling-up of successful innovations.