Valenciano Martínez-Orozco (PSE), draftsman of the opinion of the Committee on Women’s Rights and Equal Opportunities. – (ES) Mr President, it is the people with least resources who suffer the worst health. Illness and poverty are two sides of the same coin and therefore any strategy for combating poverty must take account of this interrelationship. Lack of health drastically reduces the opportunities for the peoples and groups suffering from it to develop. In developing countries, 28 000 children under five years old die every day as a result of illnesses which can be prevented with existing medicines. Diarrhoeal diseases alone kill more than a million and a half children per year and one in every 13 African women may die during pregnancy or childbirth, which also means that they can no longer care for the rest of their families, immediately increasing their risk of death.

AIDS, as well as killing more than 2 million people in Africa, is hindering the possibilities for development in a society by removing thousands of active young people and mothers who, in turn, leave behind orphans.

Women are the poorest and suffer most from illness in the developing countries. Furthermore, they are much more vulnerable to risks of illness, which is always linked to poverty, precisely as a result of their reproductive role. That is why we have wished to highlight the importance of information, but also of access to reproductive health services, which would help to prevent the spread of AIDS, illnesses caused by continual pregnancies, births and clandestine abortions.

Incorporating the views of women into the fight against poverty and illness is essential to the least-favoured societies since they are responsible for the care of children and because they are an indispensable factor in the well-being of individuals, families, local collectives and nations.

We believe that, thanks to this report, whose rapporteur, Mr Bowis, has been so much in favour of incorporating the gender perspective into it, the Commission’s Communication has been improved. Perhaps the same can be said for the still weak position occupied by women in the development policy of the European Union, which I believe must continue to strive to fulfil its commitments.