Most people still don’t know what fistula is, even though it affects so many. During prolonged labour, soft tissues of the pelvis are compressed between the descending baby’s head and the mother’s pelvic bone, a specialist explained.
The lack of blood flow causes tissue to die, creating a hole between the mother’s vagina and the bladder, or between the vagina and the rectum, or both.
The result is the leaking of urine or faeces or both.
Left untreated, fistula can lead to frequent ulceration and infections, kidney disease and even death.
Some women drink as little as possible to avoid leakage and become dehydrated. Damage to the nerves in the legs leaves some women with fistula unable to walk, and after treatment they may need extensive physical rehabilitation.
Affected women are often abandoned or neglected by their husbands and family and ostracised by their communities. Without treatment, their prospects for work and family life are greatly diminished and they are often left to rely on charity.
“When I could no longer stay dry and control my faeces, my husband told me that he would not take me anywhere. My husband does not give me food.”
from the same article
In Ghana, the exact prevalence of fistula is not known, but it is estimated that the condition affects a minimum of two or three per 1,000 expectant women, meaning an annual incidence of between 100,000 and 150,000 patients.
The condition occurs all across the country but it has been found to be more prominent among communities which practise female genital mutilation, particularly in the Northern, Upper East and Upper West regions.
Female genital mutilation sometimes leaves big scars which cause the vulva to close, leaving a small hole for the passage of urine.
This makes child bearing impossible without aid and any excessive pressure on the bladder by the baby’s head could easily rapture it, resulting in vaginal fistula.
[JURIST] Kenya’s National Assembly has unanimously approved a sex-crimes law after a month of heated debate over several controversial provisions, most of which were dropped in order to pass the bill. Legislators dropped provisions criminalizing marital rape and female genital mutilation, as well as a provision shifting the burden of proof from the accuser to the accused.
The World Health Organization said Friday that female genital mutilation is a form of “torture” that must be stamped out, even if t is performed by trained medical personnel.
The “medicalization” of female genital mutilation _ often called female circumcision and also known as FGM _ fails to prevent innocent girls from being permanently scarred by the procedure, threatening them as adults when giving birth and endangering the lives of their newborn babies, WHO said in unveiling a report on genital mutilation’s maternal health effects.
Women with FGM are significantly more likely than those without FGM to have adverse obstetric outcomes. Risks seem to be greater with more extensive FGM.
FGM consists of all procedures that involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs whether for cultural or other non-therapeutic reasons.1 It is common in several countries, predominantly in Africa, and more than 100 million women and girls are estimated to have had FGM worldwide. Whether obstetric outcomes differ between women who have and those who have not had FGM is unclear, since previous studies have been small and methodologically limited, so have been unable to provide reliable evidence, especially in relation to important outcomes, such as perinatal death.
Via Elise in the dKos thread on the same topic, and Oprah, here’s the link to one charity that works on this: the Fistula Foundation
This is crossposted at the orange place (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/6/4/1829/81847) and was front paged earlier on European Tribune.
It leaves me at a loss for words.
I saw the Oprah episode on this. It’s heartbreaking. The smiles on the faces of the women who underwent reparative surgery said it all. They were used to leading lives of humiliation and despair, and now they saw some hope for their lives. It’s more than a worthy cause.
Well according to DTF, we should accept this as just another cultural difference. I mean, they chose to be mutilated because mom and dad told them they would be unclean if they weren’t mutilated. If they then develop holes in their vaginas, well I am sure they deserved them because DTF says it is a cultural thing.
DTF…I love most of what you say, but this story is another reason we have to speak out against FGM and try to educate these women. It may be a cultural thing, but it is a dangerous thing and no one benefits from the results, least of all the women.
I have made the suggestion to several people, and I would actually suggest it as good practice for everyone, that it would be very helpful to your readers to include links with comments similar to the above.
It will give your accusations more impact, and without intending to suggest that you lack it, credibility.
For example, suppose that I wish to communicate to others that you hold a particular view regarding, for example, abortion.
Which do you think will pack more punch, just implying that you are against abortion, or including a link to a post you made where you say that you oppose it?
Sometimes what the reader needs to read and what the writer wrote may have some differences.
That has to be respected, I think, but I know that you will also want to respect your readers whose needs may be less emotionally interesting and more mundane, but nevertheless just as valid!
ROFL… This was exactly what I was expecting as a response.
You are just too easy! :>) Sorry, I just couldn’t resist given the topic.
I was just trying to get your goat. I can’t find the discussion as you and I are just so damn prolific and it was a while ago! :>) But, you know and the board knows that you advocated the use of hospitals to perform FGM because it was safer than doing it at home and after all, because it was a cultural thing we should offer a safer alternative. Needless to say, we did not agree as I wanted to teach these girls that mutilating their bodies was dangerous and served no purpose.
FGM does more harm than good and rather than succomb to the old “cultural difference” route (which is valid in many circumstances), we need to teach these girls that they don’t need to mutilate their bodies to be women.
But, I guess that is more American “exceptionalism”. Who are we to say what is right for these girls?
DTF…I hope you are back to stay. I’ve missed you and your views, even when I disagree profoundly. I still want to have an afternoon over turkish coffee (or tea) with you.
P.S.: If you can give me at least the month that we talked about FGM, I would be willing to search the archives some more for your posts on the subject.
I’m thinking February, and I recall the discussion very well. It was the most profoundly infuriating thing I’ve ever read. If your quote isn’t right on, it’s awfully close.
I think somebody counted up the times in that thread that I said I was opposed to FGM so it might be hard to use that particular thread to warn others of my evilness.
My opposition to it is more related to saving lives and quality of life as opposed to demonstrating that one cultural tradition is superior to the other, and I would like to see the custom actually changed at the indigenous level in such a way as to have that element of the coming of age ritual be more symbolic, and not involve cutting, touching, or exposure of the genitals in any way.
This is quite naturally a very unpopular view in the west, and makes a much more effective and enlightening warning to others of my evilness than merely saying I support FGM.
The danger of the latter is that there might be those with better search skills than either of us, and who might also be evil enough to use them, and post with links, some of those 9 squillion instances of me saying I am against it.
But because they do not say WHY I am against it, the innocent would still not realize the extent and profundity of my evilness, and would like you, fall into the trap of merely thinking I am “easy.”
That is a perfect DTF response. Thank you.
I understood what you were saying, I just disagreed. It’s ok to do that around here. ;>)
You mean you’re not “easy”…oh be still my beating heart.
Your points were not lost on us silly Westerners. Given the option between a safe procedure and an unsafe one, we will pick the safe one every time. Abortion or Plan B… Plan B comes out on top. FGM is not safe no matter where it’s done. But, if a woman insisted, we would opt for the safer method. But you did not make a good argument for safety, you made an argument for non-interference. Two different things. I opt for interference in a procedure that only brings harm and pain. I am much more in their face than you want to be. Perhaps that is because I am a woman and you are not.
I never said you were evil, talk about melodramtic. My kid and her friends call this behavior “emo” as in “emotional”. It’s a good tag for those of us who let our emotions get in the way. Claiming that I think you are “evil” is way “emo”. :>) Not to say that I am not way emo either. Politics and women’s issues bring out the emo in me too.
You make a very good point, I think, precisely because it is an emotional issue, it may be possible that there are people who would also wish to have the practice replaced by symbolism, and who sincerely would wish to see lives saved, and quality of life improved.
However because of the emotional heat, doubled, with reference to this particular issue, as it involves not only issues of gender but of culture, it is very easy to allow one’s eyes to stray from the prize.
I think the current controversy in the US over the question of ownership of women’s bodies has many areas that make a good comparison. As you point out, most women who do not wish to become mothers would prefer “plan B” to having an abortion, and would prefer having an abortion performed by a physician under sanitary conditions, etc, to the legendary “back alley” option.
However, there is a very strong political will in the US for the back alley.
Now the back alley advocates do not call themselves that, and they will in fact, take offense if you suggest to them that their efforts to ban legal abortion will result in the needless deaths of many young women, and leave several times that number with serious health problems, some for life. And those who survive who at some point do wish to become (biological) mothers are much more likely to learn that their back alley procedure has deprived them of that option.
Many, in fact, it might be safe to say most, of those who work to send young women to that back alley will tell you that their views are based on grounds that are religious, moral, or both. They believe that once fertilization has occurred, the resulting cell grouping is a full-blown human being, and therefore to terminate a pregnancy is to take a life.
You may also be aware that many of these folks are also opposed to vaccinations which could prevent a very common form of cervical cancer. That view, they say, is based on their belief that sexual behavior outside of marriage is wrong. It is against their moral values. Thus, they argue, to allow women to be vaccinated against the virus that causes this form of cervical cancer could, by removing one of the risks of sexual behavior, encourage young women to engage in it.
This is similar to the popular argument that the only thing that young people should be taught about the subject of human sexuality, sexually transmitted diseases and the like, is that they should not engage in sexual behavior. To even teach them about contraception, protection against disease, much less making condoms and the like available to these young folks will, in their view, encourage them to commit acts which are, according to their beliefs, morally wrong.
Some will be insulted if it is pointed out that doing what they advocate kills millions of young people, causes millions more to contract diseases that could be easily prevented, some whose effects are relatively minor and easily cured, providing the sufferer is able to purchase medical treatment, and others can cause life-long impact even with medical treatment.
No, they will say, we don’t want them to die, we just want them to adhere to our moral values and/or religious beliefs. If they will do that then society will not have these problems, either of unwanted pregnancies or sexually transmitted diseases.
For these people, their “prize” may be young people not having sex in the first place, the religious beliefs of others may permit contraception, and their “prize” may be using that contraception to prevent unwanted pregnancies from occurring, outside of marriage or inside it.
But because these are very emotional issues, touching on very strongly held beliefs, they do not even keep their eyes on the prize that is realistically winnable, nor do they recognize which prizes are not.
For example, if one’s prize is no unwanted pregnancies, and therefore no abortions, that might not be winnable, but a dramatic reduction in unwanted pregnancies, and therefore in abortions, is very winnable.
And it is obvious to most thinkers that the best way to reduce the incidence of unwanted pregnancies is to make contraception widely and easily available to every individual who is biologically capable of reproduction, and that efforts to prevent people from obtaining contraceptive devices will, if successful, actually increase the number of unwanted pregnancies.
By the same token, to ban teaching young people about disease prevention will not reduce the number of young people who have sex, and it will increase the incidence of disease. And unwanted pregnancies.
So the back abortion and STD epidemic enthusiasts are either lying about what their prize is, or they are so carried away by emotions that they are letting their eyes stray from the prize!
Young people will engage in sexual activity. Sometimes even the most well-intentioned people of all ages will engage in “unprotected” sexual activity. Sometimes contraception methods will fail.
No one’s religious beliefs, no laws, no matter how severe the penalty for non-compliance, no matter how stingently enforced, will change that.
Now to apply all this to the subject of FGM, people will engage in cultural practices, including rite of passage rituals. Whether having cultural traditions is an instinct, like the instinct to engage in sexual activity, is something that whole flocks of ologists of many ologies debate with great zeal, and I will not attempt to introduce that debate here, but I will say that whether instinctive or not, cultural traditions and rituals of one kind or another are universal.
Therefore, the elimination of rite of passage rituals is not a winnable prize, no matter how strongly you or I may believe that any or all aspects of any given ritual is wrong, or on what grounds we believe it is wrong.
We must be honest with ourselves on the question of what our prize is, and whether that prize is winnable, and if so, what will be the most effective strategy to win that prize.
Regarding FGM, I object to it on a long list of grounds. Your list may be just as long or longer. Both our lists are irrelevant, and they are especially irrelevant to people who practice FGM.
It is a fact that FGM causes needless suffering and death.
The prize my eyes are on is the cessation of the death and suffering. Maybe that is not a winnable prize, but a dramatic and drastic reduction in FGM-related death and suffering IS winnable. As your kid and her friends might say, “It is totally winnable.”
I want that totally winnable prize too much to take my eyes away from it because some of the reasons WHY I want it may lend themselves easily to “emo.”
In the article on the subject of FGM I posted here some time ago, I outlined my thoughts and opinions regarding effective strategies for winning THAT prize, and that prize only, namely the dramatic and drastic reduction in FGM-related death and suffering.
NOTES:
Not to worry. There are many others from which one could select. 😉
in my opinion, select and quote and include the link.
While there are certainly millions of internet denizens who would have no need of links, and for whom your declaration would be sufficient, there are also millions of others, who might be potentially your greatest allies in spreading the word, but also just happen to be of the persnickety type who would want to have a link, just to add that extra punch and impact to the message, in order to maximize the quality as well as number of conversions. 😉
This is the closest I could get to the link as I am unable to open a diary with so many comments. (Unfortunately, I never got to read all the discussion because the number of comments exceeded my computers capacity by the time I got to it.)
Female Genital Mutilation
by DuctapeFatwa
Thu Feb 9th, 2006 at 06:41:09 AM ADT
I was accused yesterday of “supporting” this custom, and because it is a subject about which I feel strongly, and because I am never without awareness that this is a public board and there may be lurkers with a sincere interest, I will say a few words about it.
Read more… (211 comments, 1332 words in story)