The government of El Salvador took a truly extraordinary step in an attempt to control the rapidly spreading Zika virus last week by asking its citizens to avoid getting pregnant from now until 2018. Yes, you read that right.

The fires that blazed in Indonesia’s rainforests in 1982 and 1983 came as a shock. The logging industry had embarked on a decades-long pillaging of the country’s woodlands, opening up the canopy and drying out the carbon-rich peat soils. Preceded by an unusually long El Niño-related dry season, the forest fires lasted for months, sending vast clouds of smoke across Southeast Asia.

From earthquakes to floods, when natural disasters strike, the military is often called on to bolster civilian responses. Policymakers throughout Latin America in particular are increasingly relying on the armed forces for emergency assistance.

While it is intuitively clear that economic growth is related to water security – understood here as both water availability and also exposure to water-related risks such as drought and floods – there has been very little empirical evidence of this relationship to date.

In high-income countries, as many as 10 to 15 percent of women experience depression, anxiety, or other non-psychotic mental health challenges during pregnancy or the year after giving birth. In developing countries, the chances rise to 16 percent of pregnant women and 20 percent of post-natal women, according to Jane Fisher, professor of women’s health at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. [Video Below]

Few would argue with the notion that socioeconomic development is contingent on peace, safety, and security. What goes for nations, goes for people too – especially young people.