Surviving Gender based Violence

Papua New Guinea has some of the worst health statistics in the Pacific region. It also has one of the world’s highest rates of gender-based violence. Women and children are often targets of physical and sexual attacks. In 2008, an Australian government study concluded that 55 per cent of the women in PNG had been forced to have sex against their will. Médecins Sans Frontières saw the need for better medical care for survivors of gender-based violence. It opened the Women and Children’s Support Centre in Lae, the second largest city and biggest harbour in the country.