Sunday, 6 February marks the International Day of Zero Tolerance for female genital mutilation (FGM). This year’s theme is "Accelerating Investment to End FGM" — calling for support for programmes to provide services and response for those affected and those at risk; in developing and enforcing laws, and fortifying institutional capacity to eliminate the practice.

Two new tools have been launched by WHO and HRP to help health-care providers give the best quality care to girls and women who have been subjected to FGM – and to also support global efforts to end this harmful practice and human rights violation.

Good quality research can only be ensured when the human rights of all research participants are safeguarded and respected.  However, specific ethical guidance for conducting research on female genital mutilation (FGM) has been unavailable – until today. WHO has launched a new guidance document to strengthen the ethical conduct of all research on FGM: Ethical considerations in research on female genital mutilation. This has been launched alongside a new document from WHO, UNICEF, UNFPA, and Population Council, Kenya – the research agenda to strengthen evidence generation and utilization to accelerate the elimination of female genital mutilation.