Description
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) sought to achieve social development as a basic pillar of poverty eradication in developing countries; but performed worst according to measurements of infant health (infant mortality) and maternal health (maternal mortality). According to Global Sustainable Development Report 2019, the four-year Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) performance from 2016 reveals social inequalities are deepening around the world. In particular, gender inequality exposes women and girls who are considered as the most vulnerable to overlapping social inequalities to health challenges.
On the Korean Peninsula where tensions over North Korea’s nuclear problem have eased, it is meaningful to observe the similarities and differences between South Korea and North Korea on women’s health and health security challenges. While two Koreas have a long history of a patriarchal society with similar Confucian traditions, the paper looks at how gender equality is represented in the course of division for the past 70 years and how it is related to comprehensive health. Under the social and political atmosphere toward a health community on the Korean Peninsula, we could see the policy implications of easing UN sanctions on North Korea in the future and mutual cooperation in women’s health in improving relations between South Korea and North Korea.
The paper will review relevant SDG reports with an emphasis on gender and health-related goals and targets. The similarities and differences between two Koreas on health will be analyzed using the comprehensive gender-sensitive health matrix. In light of the SDGs’ main slogan “Leave No One Behind,” this paper focuses on three key questions: (1) main health security challenges the Korean Peninsula encounters; (2) the status of the implementation of SDGs in gender and health-related goals in the Korean Peninsula; (3) policy recommendations to improve the Korean Peninsula’s health security challenges.
