Women's health Archives - International Alliance of Women

My Voice, My Choice

IAW Communications Unit — Sat, 25 May 2024 03:45:21 +0000

For Safe And Accessible Abortion

Support women’s reproductive rights with us!

Countless lives and livelihoods are ended, disrupted, and lost because of lack of access to safe abortion in many EU countries.

This must stop.

The “My Voice, My Choice” calls all European feminists to sign the European Citizens’ Initiative advocating for right to safe and legal abortion.Together we can make women’s lives freer, safer, and better; wherever they live in our union, whatever conditions they may find themselves in.

The lack of access to abortion in many parts of Europe not only puts women at risk of physical harm but also puts undue economic and mental stress on women and families, often on the margins of society that can afford it the least.

Sign the initiative here:
https://citizens-initiative.europa.eu/initiatives/details/2024/000004_en

And please share the signature link with your network!

We thank Eekku Aromaa, Secretary Generral of our Affiliate Naisasialiitto Unioni, for the impetus to give this initiative a larger forum.

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News from IAW North America

IAW Communications Unit — Tue, 25 Jul 2023 17:05:43 +0000

Denisonians for Planned Parenthood

Reproductive rights are under attack in Ohio and the United States as a whole. Last summer, in a devastating Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade was overturned, and the right to an abortion was compromised all over the U.S. Fifteen states have banned abortion in the U.S., and only a handful of these have exceptions in place for cases of rape or incest. There is a petition in Ohio right now to add an amendment to the state constitution on the November ballot. If passed, this amendment would guarantee individuals the right to make and carry out their own reproductive decisions, and we are pleased to announce that the petition has gathered enough signatures in order for the proposed amendment to make it onto the ballot. This is a significant step in a state where reproductive rights are hotly contested in our government.

I am a student at Denison University in Granville, OH. On campus, I am an executive board member of Denisonians for Planned Parenthood, our campus reproductive rights organization. As a sophomore, I was the club co-secretary, and as a junior, I am the current treasurer. Our club is one of the largest on campus, and we organize many events throughout the year to engage our club members in reproductive rights advocacy and education through an intersectional lens.

Our club aims to combat these attacks against reproductive rights through education and activism. For example, we attended a protest at the Ohio Statehouse. We also hosted several speakers virtually for panels. One panel was titled “Abortion in America: During, Before, and After Roe,” and it was hosted in conjunction with our college’s Lisska Center for Intellectual Engagement. Our panelists included Dr. Christine Henneberg (a practicing abortion provider and writer), Professor Mary Ziegler (a legal scholar and past professor at UC Davis and Harvard Law School), and Professor Jennifer Holland (a historian and associate professor of history at the University of Oklahoma). Another panel we hosted was called “Reproductive Health, Rights, and Justice in Post-Dobbs Ohio.” During this panel, we interviewed Jessie Hill (Dean of Research and professor of law at Case Western University), Alana Jochum (executive director of Equality Ohio), and Michele E. Storms (executive director of ACLU Washington). Finally, we hosted a panel on the intersections of race and reproductive justice with Dr. Khiara Bridges, professor of law at UC Berkeley. Other events that we host include Reproductive Health and Justice Trivia, movie screenings, Cookies and Consent (an educational event during which we teach students about consent using cookies), and sex education information sessions.

I have loved sharing my passion for reproductive justice as a part of this club, and it has inspired me to continue to fight for women’s rights. With our work, we hope to engage our community in the conversation about reproductive rights. We hope to create a more informed campus regarding health and advocacy. Finally, we hope to support the Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio branch in their fight for justice. I hope that students at other universities in the United States will establish reproductive rights organizations on their campuses. We are the change we need in the world, and it is our job to create the future we deserve. I also hope that students at other colleges will attend protests and sign petitions supporting intersectional reproductive justice in their communities.

Abby Hasselbrink
IAW Representative at UN Headquarters
Intern on the Cities for CEDAW History and Futures Project

Editor's note:
Abby will be giving us some information about cities for CEDAW soon. So please stay tuned!

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28 May – Menstrual Health Day

IAW Communications Unit — Sun, 28 May 2023 13:42:06 +0000

Education for Menstrual Health -
an important key for the future of schoolgirls!

This has always been an important topic for Gudrun Haupter, long-time IAW Convenor of the Commission of Health. For years, mandated by Deutscher Frauenring, the German Affiliate of IAW, she had worked intensively with IAW member organisations in Africa. As a former IAW representative at WHO Geneva Gudrun Haupter knew about the precarious health condition of women and girls in developing countries.

Thanks to Gudrun Haupter’ s great international experience and many excellent contacts the IAW Water and Pads WP project could start in 2017 with her as its Co-coordinator. Now due to her increasing age-related health-problems, Gudrun Haupter can no longer fulfil this task. We all who are involved with this project express our great thanks to her, and we wish her a lot of joy and all the best.

We are very happy that the Water and Pads project will continue to be coordinated by two Co-Coordinators: Ursula Nakamura-Stoecklin, who has been with the WP-project from the beginning, and Heidi Bodmer also from ADF-SVF, the Swiss Affiliate of IAW, who succeeds Gudrun Haupter as the new Co-Coordinator.

Heidi Bodmer has a great experience in project-management and brings in a lot of motivating ideas. For two years she has already been very active and knows the WP project perfectly well. This means that in future all our work can continue in the best possible way.

Here are a few thoughts from Heidi Bodmer on menstrual health:

The monthly period, menstruation, is astonishing. It turns young girls into women. From a biological point of view, this is an amazing development. Unfortunately, these young women often do not understand what is happening in and on their bodies or why everything is changing. Although the newly awakened woman is in many places celebrated, and the facts are openly being discussed, unfortunately this progressive approach is still rather an exception. Far too often schoolgirls have to hide in shame. They cannot attend their classes due to the lack of hygiene articles. Many schools don’t have toilets at all, or the sanitation is very poor without any water.

Menstruation is often a painful hostage that turns up every month. Most of the time one hates it, but every now and then women are just happy when the so called curse announces itself. Sometimes women simply wait in vain for this bleeding! This can trigger a total feeling of happiness, as a new desired life is announced! But it can as well be a disaster if the pregnancy is unwanted. In this case very often there is no skilled assistance. If then one resorts to an illegal method, the young woman’s health is often endangered even sometimes resulting in death.

That is why our “Water and Pads” project is so important!
Thanks to education, hopefully there will be a little less suffering in this world.

www.iawwaterandpads.com

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May – A Month of Commitment to Women and Health

IAW Communications Unit — Thu, 25 May 2023 23:25:56 +0000

The Month of May, annually is celebrated as Women’s Health Month,

first observed by National Cervical Cancer Coalition. It officially started this year on May 10th with National Women’s Health Week. US department of Health and Human Services on Women’s Health observe this week annually. May 28th is also celebrated as International Day of Action for Women’s Health.

The main goal is to help women understand what steps they can take to improve their health and also to empower women to make their health a priority. Women around the world must realize that self-care is not selfish. One cannot pour out love, care and affection from an empty vessel.

It is 2023, we have come a long way from 1995, twenty eight years after countries signed pledges in the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform of Action, women still face many problems – especially the right to health, and we must recommit to address them. Of course we must celebrate women and their achievements but also this is the time to take a serious look on how women’s rights are fulfilled in the world.

Despite healthcare advance in last few years we still face wide gaps in treatment and research areas that are unique to women such as maternal and menstrual health. We live in a world where still we have gender health disparities. There are countries where talking about SRHR (Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights) is still a taboo. There are countries where women access to basic and primary health care is impossible, getting a doctor is not allowed, where period talk is disgusting, buying condoms or getting contraception services is shameful and where FGM (Female Genital Mutilation) is culture.

SRH (Sexual and Reproductive Health) problems are responsible for one third of health issues for women between ages of 14-44 years. Maternal mortality rate is unacceptably high. According to WHO report, every day in 2020 approx. 800 women died from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth, making total of 287,000 deaths. Almost 95% of maternal deaths occurred in low or low-middle income countries in 2020 where lack of awareness, strict religious or cultural environment and patriarchal society exists.

Lack of awareness is one of the reasons but denying the right to know on behalf of women and stopping health organizations and activists to work in such communities; must be considered a crime. Women and girls have specific health need and health systems around the world are failing them. Issues arises when system (government and health institutions) are neglecting their role and duties to be fulfilled. “Empowering Women” or “Inclusion of Women” has been nothing but a pipeline dream for us due to use of such terms added as a rhetorical flourish to their political speeches.

Here I would like to give a huge shout out to International Alliance of Women (IAW) for running a project “Water and Pads for Schoolgirls – Empowerment for Life” in poor, rural schools of Africa and Asia. Currently, 9 IAW member organizations are playing their role by being involved in water and pads project to break this lifelong taboo topic in local communities.

To achieve Health SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) and strengthen health system, making healthcare accessible to women organizations like WHO, UN, World Bank, Bill & Melinda Gate Foundation and many more are working to enshrine the health of women because the health of women and girls determines the health and well-being of our modern world. Importance to Health, women, and equality is already given by covering first 6 SDGs, we do not only need setting targets and indicators, but mobilize and fulfil commitments in terms of policy, provide financing to local organization to catalyze actions, to ensure that the future will bring health to all women and girls, – regardless of wherever they are. By elevating the importance of women’s health, we can deliver better care for women worldwide.

Dr. Uzma Gul
IAW Board Member
Convenor of Commission on Health

Commons Photo Credit: top of the page Source / in the text Source

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Water and Pads – 1. Report in 2023

IAW Communications Unit — Sat, 11 Mar 2023 15:12:54 +0000

Planning - learning - trying - networking

Even with a lot of planning things very often turn out differently than expected. The IAW colleagues involved in the WP project know this particularly well!

For them, it is always a matter of looking for new ways to achieve their goals when facing completely unexpected obstacles.

So due to a brutal military attack Anuarite Siirewabo from SOFEDEC in DR Congo was unable to hold her planned WP event at the Mapendo School in the city of Goma, last November.

Instead, A. Siirewabo right away got involved in emergency relief for the displaced women and children in the affected neighbourhood. The booklets about menstruation were distributed among the girls living in emergency shelters. These unprotected young women can gain some self-confidence thanks to some basic knowledge about the biological cycle.

A.Siirewabo during emergency relief actions

Joyful play with traumatized children

Now, only three months later, SOFEDEC is again planning their regular WP activities in another school at Goma.

Trying new ways and networking – this is especially true for our WP colleagues in Cameroon.

Since the start of the WP project in 2017 Rebecca Juga, the coordinator of the IAW organisation BAWUFAG situated in the Bali area of Northern Cameroon wanted to participate. But due to the permanent cruel attacks of military gangs the schools got closed in 2018. Consequently, many inhabitants of this dangerous region had to flee, and by now quite a large Bali-community has settled around Yaoundé, the capital of Cameroon. Now at the new place Rebecca Juga and her colleagues of BAWUFAG definitely wanted to start some WP activities,. Rebecca could soon establish good contacts with Akam bilingual academy, a primary and secondary school in a low-income area of Yaoundé.

Rebecca Juga

Meeting the director of Akam bilingual academy

Fortunately Rebecca could also soon get in touch with two IAW organisations based at Yaoundé.
Catherine Aba Fouda, Coordinator of RENATA welcomed Rebecca at her office and gave her a lot of helpful WP information. Also, Anne Yotchou of CEFAP was very happy to have another IAW colleague close by – an excellent networking.

With this new situation at Yaoundé we felt that we could try to get our educational booklets printed on site.

In fact this is an important point for the sponsors of the WP project, because the production on site can promote some local value creation. We already had a successful pilot-project last year. In fact the costs for the printing at Harare in Zimbabwe had been very reasonable thanks to the clever negotiations of Rita Marque Mbata, Coordinator of WCCF.

So our small working group “WP booklet” with Heidi Bodmer, Pascale Vallée, Anne Yotchou and me met in January 2023 by Zoom. It was so lucky having Anne with us, because she right away tackled the issue with much zeal. She coordinated everything with her colleagues: the amount of booklets each one needed, getting a favourable price and finally organizing the distribution. It all worked out perfectly.

Rebecca could collect her share just in time before the start of her WP-activities. In Cameroon the schools like to have special events at this season, because of their national youth-day on 11 February. We are congratulating Rebecca for the huge success she had at “her” school.

«ABCs of being a Girl”, the booklets are ready at the printer’s shop

Anne Yotchou (left) and Catherine Aba Fouda with booklets intended for RENATA

Later on Catherine met Anne and got the booklets intended for RENATA.

This is an excellent incentive for us to promote local printing everywhere else in future!

The WP project is also developing well in other places. Despite of all the difficulties, Goma Bastola, Coordinator of RUWON Nepal has managed to hold her event planned for 2022 right at the beginning of January 2023. The WP project was welcomed with a high interest by the teaching staff at Bal Uddhar Secondary School, a high school at Katmandu. The lecture had been prepared together with the teachers. It was decided to also involve the boys in some ways. This turned out to be very successful, because now there is more mutual respect. At the same time, a sample kit of reusable sanitary pads was distributed to the girls. This is to make it easier for the students to be clean.
Unfortunately, there are many other problems in Nepal. Because of the massive poverty, the parents as well as the school can hardly afford clean drinking water, so the school children are often thirsty.

Bal Uddhar Secondary School at Katmandu, Nepal

Teacher showing a pad.

Should the boys also be present at the WP events?
Completely independent of the success in Zimbabwe and now Nepal, Thérèse Akakpo, Coordinator of LA COLOMBE, has also had positive experiences at the Complexe scolaire Le Guide at Vogan. A health expert was participating at the WP event. Questions about sexually transmitted diseases were also discussed here. Everyone realised how important it is to act responsibly –
and here, too, the schoolgirls have gained a lot of self-confidence!

WP Activities at Complexe scolaire Le Guide, Vauban, Togo

09.03.2023 Ursula Nakamura, Co-Coordinator IAW Water and pads project

Editor's note:
This beautiful report can also be downloaded here so that it can be shown on occasion. The occasion would be, for example, when requesting a donation for the project. The donor can immediately see how wisely and usefully the money is invested.

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World Day of Fight Against Sexual Exploitation

IAW Communications Unit — Sat, 04 Mar 2023 12:46:12 +0000

Since 2009, March 4th has been designated as the World Day of the Fight Against Sexual Exploitation

Every year on that day, hundreds of thousands of activists, community members and leaders around the globe recognize the importance of combating this heinous violation of human rights and reaffirm their commitment to fight it and expand services and protections for the survivors.

In the International law, “sexual exploitation” is defined as any actual or attempted abuse of a position of vulnerability, differential power, or trust, for sexual purposes, including, but not limited to, profiting monetarily, socially or politically from the sexual exploitation of another.

According to the International Labor Organization, close to 5 million people annually, exclusively female, are victims of forced sexual exploitation. Children comprise more than a fifth of all victims of commercial sexual exploitation. Male individuals are not immune either. A significant number of boys and young men get trapped in sexual exploitation as well. Members of the LGBT community are especially vulnerable due to stigma and lack of specialized services.

While understanding that sexual exploitation may any individual, we recognize that this grave violation of human rights, often amounting to the crime of human trafficking, is gendered, and rooted in structural discrimination and inequalities. We support the General Recommendation on Trafficking of Women and Girls in the Context of Global Migration, which was adopted by the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) Committee on 6 November 2020 and acknowledged that widespread trafficking in women and girls persists because of a lack of appreciation of the gender dimensions of trafficking, which leaves women and girls exposed to different types of exploitation, including sexual exploitation.

The CEDAW Committee’s affirmation that trafficking in women and girls is rooted in sex-based discrimination and is a form of gender-based violence, and consequently a function of abuse of male power and privilege, is critical to ensuring that responsibility and accountability is placed on perpetrators, and not on women and girls whose rights are being violated and need to be supported to exit sexual exploitation. Across all societies, persisting norms and stereotypes regarding male domination, and their control and power over women and girls enforce patriarchal gender roles and male sexual entitlement which generate the demand.

We support the CEDAW Committee’s analysis and recommendation, which encourages governments to address underlying structural gender and socio-economic inequalities that make women and girls vulnerable to exploitation. We also applaud the committee’s call on governments to address the demand that fuels the criminal market of human beings for sexual exploitation.

Eradicating sexual exploitation and human trafficking requires collective action and multidisciplinary collaboration on a global scale. The international Alliance of Women reaffirms its commitment to partner with stakeholders around the world in fighting this heinous violation of human rights and assisting the survivors.

Dr Antonia Lavine
IAW Treasurer
Coordinator of the San Francisco Collaborative Against Human Trafficking

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International Day for the Elimination of FGM – 2023

IAW Communications Unit — Sun, 05 Feb 2023 22:09:56 +0000

Commons Photo Credit: Source

"Zero Tolerance to FGM" originated on Feb. 6th, 2003.
20 Years passed but FGM is still an issue!

Call for involvement and commitment against female genital mutilation

Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is recognized as a violation of the fundamental rights of girls and women, and is a reflection of deep-rooted gender inequality in some African countries for the preservation of their traditions. Since these mutilations are almost always practiced on minors, they also constitute a violation of the rights of the child. The consequences of this practice are enormous and affect the intimate life of women, their psychology, their physique and disturb their entire sexual life, health, etc. In some African countries where this custom is rampant, there are national laws to fight against all forms of violence against women but they are often not respected. FGM practiced on minors not only is violence against women, but also violence against children. We seek the involvement and commitment of communities to unite as one against these acts of FGM in order to promote the rights of children and eradicate this gender inequality. It is the national communities that must be informed, trained, sensitized in order to work against FGM, on the one hand, on the other hand, advocacy work by civil society actors must be organized and must be addressed to the heads of states of African countries in which this violation of law is still practiced. This concern should be one of the priorities of the United Nations Human Rights Commission. It is with these words that we commemorate the International Day of Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation this year 2023. Kinshasa, February 5, 2023 For NGO Vision Communautaire, Mrs. Ntakebuka Wilhelmine

We received this valuable contribution for publication directly from Ntakebuka Wene Mwafizi Wilhelmine, our Regional Vice President for Africa Francophone.

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International Day of Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation

IAW Communications Unit — Sun, 05 Feb 2023 22:00:08 +0000

“ We can STOP it NOW ”

Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) comprises all procedures that involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.
Female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) is one of the most prevalent harmful cultural practices against women and girls in many African countries.
Female genital mutilation is a violation of the human rights, health, integrity and personal development of girls and women, stripping them off their childhood and excluding them from education.
FGM is often considered a necessary part of raising a girl, and a way to prepare her for adulthood and marriage. This can include controlling her sexuality to promote premarital virginity and marital fidelity.

What are the signs and symptoms of FGM?

Having difficulty walking, standing or sitting.
Spending longer in the bathroom or toilet.
Appearing quiet, anxious or depressed.
Acting differently after an absence from school or college.
Reluctance to go to the doctors or have routine medical examinations.

In my country, Cameroon, like in many other places, the purpose of female genital cutting is to ensure that a girl behaves properly, saves her virginity until she gets married and then stays faithful to her husband.
We identified reasons for the failure of the legal approach to stop FGC practice in Cameroon through multi-locale ethnographic field-work. Cultural and social factors for performing FGM

Why is it important to stop FGM?

FGM is a violation of girls’ and women’s rights

Briqueterie and Tsinga neighborhoods in Cameroon’s capital, Yaoundé, are the places where female genital mutilation, or FGM, is resurging because there is a high concentration of people from Kousseri on Cameroon’s northern border with Chad and Nigeria that believe in FGM as a way to keep women faithful to their husbands.
Our organization with many others civil society networks keep educating the communities that it is illegal and unhealthy to cut a girl’s clitoris.
The practice is actually current not only in the Far North region on Cameroon’s border with Nigeria, but also the English-speaking Southwest region where campaigns to stop FGM is always going on because we still have girls victims.
Government in Cameroon is also doing a great job to end the practice by providing funds to start other businesses to women that were practicing FGM on girls as their income generating activities. FGM is a crime, nobody should remain silent.

By Anne Pélagie YOTCHOU TZUDJOM
Coordinator of CEFAP-LADIES CIRLCE, IAW Water & Pads Project
IAW Board Member

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Information Material about Water and Pads Project

IAW Communications Unit — Sat, 24 Sep 2022 16:49:01 +0000

Water and Pads Flyer is finalized!

We announced an update for the WP flyers.

Here it is!

You can find all relevant information in brief form.

For more details about all successful WP activities please go to the Water and Pads website

Click on the image or here to download the Wataer and Padys flyer as a pdf file.

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