The international men's health movement

Has grown to the stage that it can start to influence international bodies

Men's health is emerging as an important issue in an increasing number of countries around the world, notably the United Kingdom, Austria, Switzerland, Australia, and the United States. There is also increasing interest in working with men on sexual and reproductive health issues in parts of Central and South America, Africa, and Asia. However, progress towards international contact and collaboration between men's health advocates with an interest that extends beyond traditional clinical concerns such as erectile dysfunction or prostate cancer has so far been extremely slow.

In many ways this is not surprising. The idea that men have specific health needs, experiences, and concerns related to their gender as well as their biological sex is relatively new—certainly much newer than the concept of “women's health.”1 The psychosocial aspects of male health are still not accepted, or even understood, by many health practitioners and policymakers. Moreover, even in those countries where greater attention has been paid to men's health issues, initiatives have generally remained …