As part of the 2011 International Conference on Family Planning in Dakar, Senegal, I participated in a USAID-sponsored meeting on postabortion care. I learned several things that seemed unfathomable, including:

• Of the 205 million pregnancies each year in Africa, 40% are unplanned and 20% result in unsafe abortions.
• Of the women seeking abortion— which, let's face it, happens whether or not it is legal—65 % are married, 50% are interested in contraception, and 20% are repeat aborters.
• Of the women in Africa who die each year from unsafe abortion, a staggering 46% are under the age of 25.

What this tells us about the magnitude of unmet need for family planning is clear. In Africa alone, 137 million women have an unmet need for family planning. Look at that number: 137 million women.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday spoke at the Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) about the Global Health Initiative (GHI), which she described as a “new approach, informed by new thinking […] to save the greatest possible number of lives.”