Author: storiesinamerica

“It still feels like yesterday that it happened. It’s very close, very recent and I never think of it as something that happened a long time ago. The wounds that are inside me will, I guess, always be there. I am in the UK to have reconstruction surgery on my face – maybe it’s going to be different after that. Maybe I will feel better when my face is redone. But I think we will always be haunted from the inside because we can’t have back all the people we lost, my family, my friends, neighbours. We won’t forget them and they won’t be resurrected. I don’t think much about my ambitions any more.I don’t have many dreams. I used to dream but I never got to achieve any of the things I had wanted to. It’s not something I dare to think of because I could die in an accident today. Maybe after the surgery, when I’m fine, I’ll start thinking about it.”
-Odette Mupenzi, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide in which an estimated 800,000 people were killed, speaking to the BBC. Today marks the 12th anniversary of the start of the killings.
Reproductive Rights

High court approves but limits informed consent abortion law – AP
A law requiring doctors to tell patients about abortion risks before performing the procedure won unanimous approval Thursday from the Florida Supreme Court, but the justices put some limitations on it. In an opinion written by Justice R. Fred Lewis, the high court rejected a challenge by a doctor and abortion clinic claiming a 1997 law was unconstitutionally vague and violated women’s privacy rights. The high court interpreted the law to require that doctors discuss only medical matters, not economic, psychological, social, religious or other issues, even though the law does not use the word “medical.”

General

New Miss. law affirms rights of breast-feeding mothers – AP
Getty Israel knows firsthand the benefits of breast-feeding: It’s one of the ways she provided nutrition to her son when he was a baby. She hopes a new Mississippi law will help raise awareness of the health benefits of nursing, while also giving support to moms as they try to care for their infants and toddlers. The new law places requirements on child-care facilities, mandating that each of them provide a place – other than a toilet – for mothers to either breast-feed their babies or pump milk. The law says the designated area must have a comfortable chair, an electrical outlet and access to running water.

Politics

U.S. Will Not Join U.N. Rights Council – Washington Post
The Bush administration will not seek a seat this year on the new U.N. Human Rights Council, marking the first time in more than half a century that the United States has chosen not to pursue membership in the United Nations’ principal rights organization.

Republicans fail to pass budget, tax bills – Reuters
Republicans in the U.S. Congress suffered two major setbacks on Thursday when their fiscal 2007 budget plan collapsed and they failed to put the finishing touches on $70 billion in tax cuts. The developments could not have come at a worse time as Republicans, who control both chambers of Congress and the White House, were hoping to shake election-year blues dominated so far by ethics scandals and sinking popularity. Now, instead of returning to their home districts for a two-week spring break touting tax cuts and the passage of a budget they hoped would trim huge budget deficits, Republicans will greet their constituents empty-handed.

Charon Asetoyer: A True Alternative – The Nation
Last February, South Dakota lawmakers approved the nation’s most restrictive ban on abortion, setting the stage for new legal challenges that its supporters hope will lead to an overturning of Roe v. Wade. The measure, which passed the state Senate 23 to 12, makes it a felony for doctors to perform any abortion, except to save the life of a pregnant woman. This law is clearly illegal. And don’t believe the hype that this new law is what most South Dakotans want. There are some very angry women in the state, and one of them, Charon Asetoyer, recently announced her candidacy for the South Dakota State Senate. Asetoyer, the Executive Director of the Native Women’s Health Education Resource Center, is running against an opponent who compiled a zero voting rank on women’s health and safety issues during his previous legislative term.

In the Workplace

Few women take pregnancy leave in California, study finds – UC Berkeley
Only one in three working women who qualify for pregnancy leave in California take advantage of the employee benefit, according to a new study by researchers at University of California, Berkeley. Those who do cite medical necessity, physical discomfort and stress or fatigue as the reason for taking time off from work before their baby is born. The study, one of the first to examine how women in California use their maternity leave benefit, was published online on March 31 by Maternal and Child Health Journal. It will appear in print later this month when the journal’s delayed January 2006 issue goes to press. “What struck us most is that so few women do think about taking leave,” said the study’s lead author, Sylvia Guendelman, a professor of maternal and child health in UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health. “And when they do, it’s because they have to, not because they want to.”

Young Women Face Culture Shock in First Jobs – Women’s eNews
Spring is here and many female college grads will soon report to their first days of work. Even though they join an increasingly female work force, many young women say the transition from school to work is loaded with culture shock.

International

Genocide survivor can’t forgive – BBC
Odette Mupenzi is a survivor of the Rwandan genocide in which an estimated 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed. Now in the UK and awaiting reconstructive surgery, she tells the BBC on the 12th anniversary of the start of the killings that she is not willing to forgive and forget the people who murdered her family and shattered her mouth and jaw.

World ‘lacks 4m health workers’ – BBC
Four million health workers are needed to combat the “chronic shortage” around the world, a report from the World Health Organization has warned. Fifty-seven countries have a serious shortage of health workers, affecting children’s jabs, pregnancy care and access to treatment, it said. Thirty-six of these countries are in sub-Saharan Africa.

Sri Lanka banks on poorest women – BBC
Women’s banks are flourishing in Sri Lanka but there are questions about whether they really make a difference to poverty. There is barely space to move in Philomena Aranasingham’s front room. She lives in the Kirullapone slums in the heart of Colombo, moments away from a still waterway with sewage floating by.

Compiled daily at StoriesinAmerica

Reproductive Rights

National Group Pledges to Ensure Right to Abortion for Women in South Dakota – National Network of Abortion Funds
The National Network of Abortion Funds (NNAF), an association of grassroots groups that raises funding for low-income women seeking abortions, announced the launch of the National Reproductive Justice Fund to help low-income women affected by the South Dakota and other state abortion bans. “We will not allow politicians in South Dakota to deny women the right to make decisions about their lives and their futures,” said NNAF Executive Director Stephanie Poggi. “Our new national fund will ensure that women have the resources and help they need to obtain abortions – no matter what the South Dakota legislature does.” In addition, NNAF supports efforts to overturn the ban including the ballot initiative and the election of pro-choice candidates to the state legislature.

House Leaders Urge Hearings On Anti-Abortion Bills – KOCO
With a legislative deadline looming, Republican legislative leaders urged the Democrat-controlled Senate Monday to schedule hearings on a slate of measures that supporters said would reduce the number of abortions in Oklahoma. Measures to strengthen an informed-consent law passed last year and regulate distribution of the so-called morning-after pill are assigned to the Senate Health and Human Services Committee, where four similar bills died in February when they were not heard.
PanAfrica: Unsafe Abortion: What Role Does Research Have? – This Day
Jemila (not her real name) was just 17 and had looked forward to writing her Senior Secondary School Certificate Examinations (SSSCE). According to family sources, she had revised her books well enough and nursed a vision of growing up to become a top professional raising her own family. But it was not to be as her dream was cut midstream. Lured into sex by a lover boy, the resultant unwanted pregnancy was too hot for her to handle. Ashamed of revealing her real state to her parents at the onset, by the time she was brought to the hospital, the complications were so terrible that she could not survive it. Jemila’s life, cut short by complications of unsafe abortion, typifies the havoc the syndrome is wreaking on the population of both young and old women in sub-Saharan Africa. Statistics arising from deaths from unsafe abortion runs into thousands annually.

Malawi: Minister Asks UNFPA for More Support On Reproductive Health – The Chronicle
The Minister of Economic Planning and Development, David Faiti, has asked the United Nations Population Fund to continue supporting the government in sexual and reproductive health activities in Malawi.

International

Kuwaiti women vote for first time – BBC
Polling is taking place in a Kuwaiti council by-election in which women are allowed to vote for the first time. Two women are also among eight candidates running for the seat in the Salmiya district, south of the capital. The 28,000 eligible voters, 60% of whom are women, are voting in segregated polling booths, a condition demanded by Islamist and tribal MPs.

Women and ‘gendercide’ – Christian Science Monitor
As I was preparing for this article, I asked a very good friend who is Jewish if it was appropriate for me to use the term “holocaust” to portray the worldwide violence against women. He was startled. But when I read him the figures in a 2004 policy paper published by the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces, he said yes, without hesitation. One United Nations estimate says that between 113 million and 200 million women around the world are “missing.” Every year, between 1.5 million and 3 million women and girls lose their lives as a result of gender-based violence or neglect. As the Economist, which reported on the policy paper, put it last November, “Every two to four years the world looks away from a victim count on the scale of Hitler’s Holocaust.” How could this possibly be true?

Violence against women in Pakistan on the rise – IRNA
According to studies, violence against women in Pakistan has been highly increased. Violence against women has increased in the past 13 years with the highest record in 2004, when over 8,000 cases of gender-based violence ere registered. Statistics of the Ministry of Women’s Welfare showed that 8,385 cases of violence against women were registered in police stations throughout the country, reported “Daily Times” in its Sunday issue.

Health

Health care changes harm poor women – San Antonio Express
Texas holds the dubious distinction of leading the nation in the number of uninsured residents. In the best of times, only one in five women eligible for subsidized family-planning care receives the aid. More women are expected to do without necessary health care as a result of a rider to the state budget that redirects $25 million during the biennium from traditional health care providers.

My recent interview with Cecilia Fire Thunder, president of the Oglala Sioux tribe in South Dakota, ran today on AlterNet.org. President Fire Thunder recently announced plans to open a clinic on her reservation to provide abortion, birth control and basic health services.

President Fire Thunder’s decision to take the lead on this issue is nothing short of remarkable considering the number of challenges on the reservation. Almost half of all Native American women in South Dakota are poor, compared with approximately 10 percent of white women, according to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research report on the Status of Women in South Dakota. Median annual earnings for women in South Dakota rank last in the nation. Furthermore, the unemployment rate on the reservation is 85 percent and the life expectancy rate is 46 for men and 55 for women.
Here are excerpts:

Rose Aguilar: Tell me about the clinic you’re planning to build.

Cecilia Fire Thunder: The proposed clinic would be for all women because right now, if a woman needs an abortion, she needs to go all the way to Sioux Falls. This clinic would go beyond abortion and contraception. We’re missing out on teaching our boys and men about what they need to do to avoid pregnancies.

Rose Aguilar: I called the governor’s office to find out what the penalty would be for women who have abortions if the law goes into effect, but haven’t received a call back. If the law is upheld, will women be able to have legal abortions on your reservation?

Fire Thunder: We don’t know. We have five Indian lawyers working on this right now. When we go face to face with the South Dakota lawmakers, we’ll be ready.

Aguilar: You’ve made it a point to talk about rape in your interviews. While the abortion ban has received widespread attention, there’s been little talk how this law would force a girl who’d been raped by a male relative to have his baby.

Fire Thunder: We need to start talking about those issues. Americans should be outraged about the number of women who are raped in this country. We need to also speak out for women in places like Afghanistan and other war-torn areas where rape is happening. This is not new. Rape has always been a part of life. Unfortunately, the world is not always a safe place for women.

Ultimately, this is a much bigger issue than just abortion. The women of America should be outraged that policies and decisions about their bodies are being made by male politicians and clergy. It’s time for women to reclaim their bodies.

Women in America have something that women in other parts of the world don’t have. Women in this country don’t appreciate their right to free speech. Women in America can be the voice of women around the world. This is a call to arms by women in the United States.

Aguilar: And not only are the anti-choicers going after abortion, they’re also going after birth control.

Fire Thunder: Women should have access to contraception. No questions asked. Contraception is a solution. Why don’t they (politicians) get it?

Aguilar: Do the women on the reservation have access to contraception?

Fire Thunder: We have Indian clinics on the reservation, so birth control is available, but it’s not enough. We’re going to go ahead with the clinic no matter what. If nothing else, we need to establish a place where women feel comfortable.

“The main problem derives from the laws, most of the time they are old and too restrictive. Many countries have either not changed these laws dating from the colonial period or put them into the criminal code, making abortion a crime.”
–Fred Sai, a gynecologist from Ghana speaking at a conference on abortion in Addis Ababa. Health officials are calling on African governments to liberalize their strict abortion laws. This year in Africa, more than four million women will face serious injuries as a result of abortions performed by unskilled people under unsanitary conditions, according to the World Health Organization. Nearly 30,000 will die.
Reproductive Rights

The Abortion-Rights Side Invokes God, Too – NY Times
In any given week, if you walked into one of Washington’s big corporate hotels early in the morning, you would find a community of the faithful, quite often conservative Christians, rallying the troops, offering solace and denouncing the opposition at a prayer breakfast. So you might be forgiven for thinking that such a group was in attendance on Friday in a ballroom of the Washington Hilton. People wearing clerical collars and small crucifixes were wedged at tables laden with muffins, bowing their heads in prayer. Seminarians were welcomed. Scripture was cited. But the name of the sponsor cast everything in a new light: the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. To its critics, Planned Parenthood is the godless super-merchant of abortion. To its supporters, it is the dependably secular defender of abortion rights. But at this breakfast, God was everywhere, easily invoked by believers of various stripes.

Plan B Proviso Added To Budget – Hartford Courant
A measure that would require all hospitals to provide emergency contraceptives to rape victims got a second chance at life when Democrats slipped it into a catch-all [CT] state budget approved by a key legislative committee Thursday. A similar measure appeared to die quietly two weeks ago, when members of the legislature’s public health committee, apparently unwilling to step into a political wasps’ nest, did not vote on the bill by the committee’s deadline. The Catholic Church vehemently opposed the requirement, arguing that in some cases emergency contraceptives can prevent implantation of a fertilized embryo, thus making them tantamount to abortion. Under a policy initiated in January, the Catholic hospitals will give a rape victim the high-dose birth control pills if blood or urine tests confirm that she is not pregnant or ovulating. If they cannot provide the pills, the hospitals have agreed to provide a written prescription or transport the victim to another hospital willing to dispense the pills.

Abstinence, not condoms, is the word in Mozambique – Baltimore Sun
In the dimly lit church made of mud brick and corrugated metal, the young people gathered here believe it is a given that safe sex is anything but safe. “From what I know, some condoms have got holes,” said 23-year-old Zodwa Ubisse, rising from a wooden bench to address 20 of her peers. “I’ve tried taking some new ones, but water comes out, so they’re not safe.” “So abstinence is the key, isn’t it?” summed up Nelda Nhantumbo, the 25-year-old student-teacher, drawing nods and murmurs of assent. That is the message going out to young people in schools, churches and social clubs across Mozambique, where about 500 people a day become infected with HIV and AIDS. The message is being delivered, in this case, by Baltimore-based World Relief, the humanitarian arm of the National Association of Evangelicals, and the United States is paying for the effort.

Strict laws, churches behind rising clandestine abortion in Africa: experts – Todayonline.com
Stringent or vague legislation, coupled with deep-rooted social and religious beliefs in many African countries, have been blamed for the rise of often life-threatening backstreet abortions, health and social experts say. Of Africa’s 53 nations, only South Africa, Cape Verde and Tunisia allow unconditional pregnancy termination within the first three months after conception. In 25 of them, abortion is only legal when the mother’s health is threatened. Some 300,000 women have abortions in Kenya yearly, of whom 21,000 are admitted to hospital from resultant complications, according to 2003-2004 statistics, and at least 3,000 die.

Politics

In Senate Race, Republican Candidate Questions Mrs. Clinton’s Abortion Message – NY Times
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton was challenged over the issue of abortion yesterday for the first time in her re-election race this year, as a possible Republican opponent tried to chip away at her image as a moderate who supports adoption. John Spencer, who leads the field of Republican candidates in endorsements and fund-raising, visited a pregnancy center in Brooklyn that promotes adoption and denounced new federal legislation that would regulate advertising for these centers. The centers often operate near and compete with abortion providers, sometimes by using graphic material to discourage abortion.

Pelosi’s goal: Democrats back on top – SF Chronicle
Pelosi presides over the House Democrats not because of her public image but because she has unified her caucus in their opposition to President Bush, seized on GOP disharmony and led her party members to believe they can soon become the majority. She is her party’s No. 1 money raiser. She is a disciplinarian, who threatens to revoke privileges of members who buck the party line. And she knows how to manage the other 200 egos that constitute the House Democratic caucus. Interviews with dozens of members of Congress and their aides portray Pelosi as in command of her caucus because she is a pragmatist who lives and breathes a single quest: to bring Democrats back to power in the House of Representatives.

International

Comprehensive Care for Victims of Domestic Violence – IPS
Experts applauded the Chilean government’s decision to provide comprehensive care for victims of domestic violence, although they warned of the enormous challenges remaining in this country and the rest of Latin America, where a large proportion of women have experienced violence at some time in their lives. One of the first measures adopted by President Michelle Bachelet after she took office on Mar. 11 was to make the public health service responsible for treating the physical and mental damages caused by domestic violence.

Venezuela courts often victimize abused women – Knight Ridder
In the land of beauty queens, there seems to be little justice for women. Venezuela has traditionally put a premium on women’s physical appearance, with hundreds of beauty contests for even little girls, along with a booming plastic-surgery industry. But the high regard for women seemingly ends with how they look. An estimated 12 women are raped daily, and at least one in 10 suffer physical abuse at the hands of their partner, according to academic studies on the subject. What’s more, nongovernmental groups tracking violence against women here estimate that only one in 10 victims of sexual abuse report it to authorities, and only one in 20 report physical violence.

Conservative woman struggles to win over Peru’s poor – Reuters
Lourdes Flores is struggling to convince Peru’s poor that she is their candidate, and not just the favorite of investors, as the conservative seeks to become the country’s first woman president. Flores, who has slipped to second place in opinion polls behind Ollanta Humala, a nationalist campaigning to increase state control of business, spent the weekend trying to show she represents more than Peru’s coastal, Europe-descended elite. “I’m going to be the most serious social reformer Peru has ever had,” she told Reuters on Saturday, just over a week before Peru’s April 9 presidential election.

“We’d all like to come to a point in time where abortion is really not necessary and there are no unwanted pregnancies. But unfortunately, history tells us that making abortions illegal does not eliminate abortion. I think we have to give the women of this state the right to deal with their own bodies and their own health care. We can’t solve complex social issues by state legislation. I don’t think we’ll eliminate abortion by telling women the state will control all reproduction. I think what will happen is we will have abortions that are illegal and unsafe.”
-Jack Billion, a Democrat running for Governor in South Dakota
Reproductive Rights

House passes bill about teaching abortion in schools – AP
High school students [in Kansas] could get a more graphic explanation about abortion procedures, including whether a fetus would feel any pain during the procedure, under a bill that passed the House. The 77-48 vote Friday on the measure, which started out dealing with reporting abortion statistics, returns the bill the Senate to consider the House changes. When the bill was debated Thursday, Rep. Jan Pauls [a Democrat] amended it to say any discussion about abortion must include a description of all methods of abortion, including what state law calls partial birth abortion. The information must include “the probable physical sensations of pain a fetus feels or detects” during the various procedures.

Idaho Senate To Debate Informed Abortion Consent Bill – KBCI
The Senate next week will debate new provisions to a 1983 Idaho law that requires women to wait 24 hours before having an abortion and be told by doctors about their fetuses and the procedure’s potential complications. The Senate State Affairs Committee voted unanimously Friday to send the amended informed consent bill to the floor for debate. The changes are meant to allow doctors to skirt the waiting period and information requirements in the case of medical emergencies.

Abortion likely to be issue in gubernatorial campaign – AP
The issue of abortion is likely to be discussed in South Dakota’s gubernatorial campaign this year, particularly if an abortion ban passed by the Legislature gets referred to a statewide public vote in November. Gov. Mike Rounds, who is seeking re-election, signed the bill, which was designed to prompt a court challenge in an attempt to have the U.S. Supreme Court reverse its Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion in 1973. The bill would ban all abortions except when necessary to save the life of a pregnant woman.

General

Gang-Rape Allegations Roil Duke, Durham – LA Times
The campus of Duke University has been awash in protests and soul-searching over allegations from a police investigation involving the school lacrosse team: that a black exotic dancer performed at a party attended by members of the team, most of whom are white; that the party grew rowdy and racial slurs were uttered; and that she was cornered, choked and gang-raped.

More Than 80 Percent of College Women Diet – HealthDay News
While dieting is a common practice among college women, a new study has found that 83 percent of them diet no matter how much they weigh. Worse, skipping breakfast and smoking are often the unhealthy techniques they use to try to reach their ideal size, said Brenda M. Malinauskas, lead author of the study, which appears in the March 31 online issue of Nutrition Journal. She and her team polled 185 women college students, aged 18 to 24, about their dieting practices and physical activity. “I was a little bit surprised about the high percentage of women dieting,” said Malinauskas, an assistant professor in the department of nutrition and hospitality management at East Carolina University, in Greenville, N.C.

In the Workplace

Mint settles with female workers – Denver Post
A class action lawsuit against the U.S. Mint in Denver has been settled for $9 million dollars. Female employees at the Mint had alleged they were the targets of sexual discrimination, harassment and retaliation. In addition to the $8,990,900 payment for damages, fees and costs to the 32 permanent and temporary female Mint employees, the terms include the appointment of an independent monitor at the Denver Mint for three years.

Pregnancy Discrimination Suit Filed Against SFO Screening Co. – BCN
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) filed a lawsuit today against a private airport screening company that alleges that a pregnant employee was discriminated against based on her gender. The EEOC has sued Covenant Aviation Security, a company that provides airport screening and baggage handling services at San Francisco International Airport. The lawsuit alleges that Covenant discriminated against pregnant employee Vanessa Calderon when the company would not accommodate Calderon’s doctor’s request that she not have to work the X-ray machine. Covenant would not modify Calderon’s usual work responsibilities to eliminate operation of the X-ray machine, which can create health risks for fetuses, according to the EEOC. Instead, Calderon was laid off, the EEOC reported. Covenant regularly made accommodations for other employees who were not pregnant and who had temporary medical conditions, according to the EEOC.

International

Woman Joins Presidential Race in Peru – AP
When the rocks started raining down on her campaign caravan, Lourdes Flores didn’t flinch. She kept her smile and forged ahead on the back of a pickup truck, protected by a plastic shield held by an aide. Flores, a single 46-year-old former legislator in a tight race to become Peru’s first woman president, was in enemy territory, a town on the cold, bleak Andean plain bordering Bolivia.

Men told: it could be rape if a woman is too drunk to say no – Telegraph
Men could be convicted of rape if they have sex with women who are too drunk to give their consent under proposals outlined by the UK Government yesterday. Tightening the law on consent was one of four proposals put forward in a consultation paper aimed at increasing the proportion of reported rapes that result in convictions – presently under six per cent.

Iraq

Saddam Better for Women – IPS
Women were far better off under former Iraq dictator Saddam Hussein, a women’s group has found after an extensive survey in Iraq. ”Under the previous dictator regime, the basic rights for women were enshrined in the constitution,” Houzan Mahmoud from the Organisation of Women’s Freedom in Iraq told IPS in an interview. The group is a sister organization of MADRE, an international women’s rights group. Under Saddam, she said, ”women could go out to work, university and get married or divorced in civil courts. But at the moment women have lost almost all their rights and are being pushed back into the corner of their house.”

Journalist Released Unharmed in Iraq – AP
erican reporter Jill Carroll was set free Thursday, nearly three months after she was kidnapped in a bloody ambush that killed her translator. She said she had been treated well. Carroll, 28, was dropped off near offices of the Iraqi Islamic Party. She walked inside, and people there called American officials, Iraqi police said. In Washington, a Pentagon spokesman said the U.S. military was not involved in Carroll’s release.

Reproductive Rights

Abortion proposal debated at hearing – AP
A public hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday took place on a bill that would ban abortions in Alabama except for those performed when the life of the mother is in danger. The bill, by Sen. Hank Erwin, R-Montevallo, would ban abortions even in cases where the mother was raped or when incest was involved. Erwin’s bill is patterned after legislation which recently passed in South Dakota banning almost all abortions. “The most important issue we can deal with in the Legislature is protecting the unborn,” Erwin said. But opponents said the legislation would hurt women.

Blue Cross won’t challenge mandated contraceptive coverage – AP
The office of the state auditor says a new mandate requiring insurance companies to include contraceptives in prescription drug plans is effective immediately. Montana Attorney General Mike McGrath issued the opinion yesterday. He says failing to include coverage for contraceptives in prescription drug plans constitutes sex discrimination. Earlier today, Blue Cross Blue Shield said it’s still working through the opinion, but does not plan to challenge it.

Many unaware of Plan B’s availability on campus – The Daily Free Press
Despite efforts by the Feminist Majority Foundation, an organization that promotes reproductive rights, is fighting to increase education about the availability of the “morning after pill” across the nation’s college campuses, many students are still unaware that BU’s own health services carries it on campus.

Zimbabwe runs out of birth control pills – NewZimbabwe.com
Zimbabwe, grappling with chronic foreign currency shortages with have hit imports of fuel and electricity, has now run out of contraceptive pills used by the majority of women. “Birth control pills are in short supply with most pharmacies in and out of Harare having run out of stock,” the state-owned Herald newspaper said on Wednesday. “I am not even sure when the next supplies will be coming because my suppliers are saying they are experiencing some difficulties in procuring oral contraceptives,” one pharmacist told the paper. Most Zimbabwean women, grappling with an economic crisis shown in soaring consumer prices and static salaries, rely on short-term oral pills which cost about Z$20,000 ($0.20) a month. Longer-term contraception requires up to Z$4m.

Catholic bishop in AIDS-affected Papua New Guinea defies Vatican over condom use – Mainichi Daily News
A Catholic bishop working to combat an AIDS epidemic ravaging the impoverished Pacific island nation of Papua New Guinea has openly questioned the Vatican’s ban on condom usage. Bishop Gilles Cote, a French-Canadian who heads the Daru-Kiunga diocese in the country’s Western Province, said he was in favor of governments providing condoms to communities where extramarital sex and multiple sex partners are commonplace. The Catholic Church, however, has repeatedly rebuffed calls for it to endorse the use of condoms in the fight against AIDS and endorses abstinence as the best way to combat the spread of the disease.

Italian poll stirs up abortion row – BBC
For the first time in 25 years abortion has become an election issue in Italy as politicians put religious and moral issues at the centre of their campaigns.

In the Workplace

Women make slow progress filling US company boards – Reuters
It will take 70 years for there to be as many women as men on the boards of directors of the 500 largest U.S. companies at the pace women are getting such positions, a study released on Wednesday revealed. Last year, women held 14.7 percent of the 5,629 seats on the boards of the top 500 companies as ranked by Fortune magazine, the study found. That number rose from 13.6 percent in 2003 and 9.6 percent in 1995, according to the study by Catalyst, a research and advisory group that works to expand workplace opportunities for women. The rate of progress over the past decade has been, on average, one-half of 1 percentage point each year, the study by the nonprofit group said.

International

Urgent Action Needed to Break Male Dominance in Thai Govt. – News Blaze
Thai women face major prejudice in politics and stark under-representation in the upper tiers of the Government, according to a United Nations-backed report launched today that sets out a raft of concrete recommendations for speeding progress in reducing gender disparities, including the use of quotas. Holding one ministerial post out of 36, with one governor out of 76, and only 10 per cent of parliamentary seats, women are strikingly under-represented in positions of power, according to the report, Women’s Right to a Political Voice in Thailand, issued by the UN Development Programme.  

Drought, Poverty Forcing Young Women Into Risky Commercial Sex – IRIN
The ongoing drought that has left hundreds of thousands in eastern Kenya facing severe food shortages has driven many rural people into these towns in search of work and food. Children are sent from deep within the interior to the roadside to sell honey and homemade crafts. In an even more disturbing trend, parents have resorted to sending their young daughters into the towns to trade their bodies for money to feed their families.

U.S. soldiers eat meals from Burger King, in al-Asad air base, 160 kilometers (100 miles) west of Baghdad, Iraq, March 4, 2006. As the construction work goes on in full scale in Balad U.S. air base and handful of other installations, with Burger King and Pizza Hut already in, it is difficult to say weather U.S. forces in Iraq are here to stay for a short term or a long term. (AP Photo /Charles J. Hanley)
“We’re pouring concrete. We’re building little fiefdoms with security, moats, and walls. Eighty percent of Iraqis will grouse, but they have no political power. We’ll stay whether they want us to or not.”
-Karen Kwiatkowski, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who served in the office of the Secretary of Defense until spring 2003, in an interview with Mother Jones

In another enlightening press conference last week, Bush said it’ll be up to future presidents to decided when to leave Iraq. Air Force mechanic Josh Remy was even more revealing in an interview with the AP. “I think we’ll be here forever,” said the 19-year-old. With easy access to Burger King and Pizza Hut, the Balad Air Base feels like home:

They’ve inherited an Olympic-sized pool and a chandeliered cinema from the Iraqis. They can order their favorite Baskin-Robbins flavor at ice cream counters in five dining halls, and cut-rate Fords, Chevys, or Harley-Davidsons, for delivery at home, at a PX-run ”dealership.” On one recent evening, not far from a big 24-hour gym, airmen hustled up and down two full-length, lighted outdoor basketball courts as F-16 fighters thundered overhead.

”Balad’s a fantastic base,” Brigadier General Frank Gorenc, the Air Force’s tactical commander in Iraq, said at his headquarters here.

Gorenc’s fellow generals at the Tallil base just scored a new $14 million dining facility.

Over the past year, the Pentagon has reportedly been building up to 14 “enduring” bases across the country–long-term encampments that could house as many as 100,000 troops indefinitely, according to Mother Jones. How much is this costing American patriots?

KBR’s first big building contract there, in June 2003, was a $200 million project to build and maintain “temporary housing units” for U.S. troops. Since then, according to military documents, it has received another $8.5 billion for work associated with Operation Iraqi Freedom. By far the largest sum–at least $4.5 billion–has gone to construction and maintenance of U.S. bases. By comparison, from 1999 to this spring, the U.S. government paid $1.9 billion to KBR for similar work in the Balkans.

Bush wants another $348 million in ‘base construction money’ as part of his 2006 emergency war funding bill.

Why feed the poor or provide the Iraqis with electricity when we can build a few more pools and fast food joints?

The swimming pool at Balad air base as seen through the window of a blackhawk helicopter,70 kilometers (44 miles) north of Baghdad, Iraq, Aug. 25, 2005. (AP Photo/Jacob Silberberg)

*This is posted daily (unless I go mad) at StoriesinAmerica

*Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich wants to require the state’s 2700 pharmacists to post signs with their names on them stating they will provide an alternative if they are out of contraception or allow the prescription to be filled at a different pharmacy. Gov. Rod Blagojevich says pharmacists who oppose dispensing contraceptives often lie to women, saying the contraception they need, including the morning after pill, is out of stock.

*Connecticut’s four Catholic hospitals will not prescribe the morning after pill if a rape victim is ovulating or one of her eggs has been fertilized.

Where is the outrage and where is the media??
Reproductive Rights

Spending on abortion vote could reach the millions – AP
A successful referral of the state’s new abortion law to the November election ballot could bring what some observers believe would be millions of dollars in advertising from both sides. Opponents of the law that would ban most abortions in South Dakota have begun a petition drive to challenge the law. They need 16,728 valid signatures by June 19. “This election is going to be incredible. I could see millions of dollars spent,” said Terry Robertson, associate professor of political communication studies at the University of South Dakota.

AG says insurance companies required to cover contraceptives – KTVQ
Montana’s attorney general says health insurance companies are required to cover contraceptives. He says the practice of denying such coverage for women is sex discrimination.

Twenty House Republicans Ask GAO to Investigate Content of Federally Funded Teen Pregnancy Prevention Programs – CQ Today
Rep. Don Manzullo (R-Ill.) and 19 other House Republicans last week wrote a letter to the Government Accountability Office asking the agency to investigate the content of federally funded teen pregnancy prevention programs, saying that some programs that market themselves as “abstinence plus” promote sexual activity, CQ Today reports. The lawmakers said some of the programs teach curricula that are “shocking at best and medically inaccurate” and asked GAO to determine whether the federal government is “funding dangerous and unhealthy programs.” Manzullo is co-sponsor of a bill (HR 3011) that would require federally funded health clinics to notify the parents of any minors seeking contraception at least five days before dispensing the contraception.

Pharmacists targeted over contraceptives – UPI
Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has proposed the state’s 2,700 pharmacies post a sign with his name on it informing about options for buying contraceptives. The governor said the proposal is aimed at pharmacists who lie when telling women contraceptives are not in stock, reports the Chicago Tribune.

Senate Kills “Morning After” Contraceptive Bill – AP
Legislation that would have allowed pharmacists to dispense “morning after” emergency contraceptive pills without a prescription from a doctor died in the Maryland Senate Tuesday by a one vote margin.

Proposals to require hospitals to carry morning-after pill raises concerns among Catholics – AP
A growing number of states are considering laws that would require hospitals to provide emergency contraception to rape victims, drawing criticism from supporters of the Roman Catholic Church, which likens the morning-after pill to abortion.
Seven states already require all hospitals to dispense the drug, which helps prevent a pregnancy within 72 hours of sex. A dozen states are considering similar legislation.

Democratic senators pledge to maintain hold on Bush’s nominee to head the FDA – AP
Two Democratic senators said Tuesday they will not stop blocking President Bush’s nominee to lead the Food and Drug Administration until the agency decides whether the emergency contraceptive Plan B can go on sale without a prescription.
Sens. Patty Murray, D-Wash., and Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y, told reporters that they met Tuesday with Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach but were unable to get a Plan B update. “He gave us no status and he couldn’t give us any kind of timeline,” Murray said.

General

New Orleans women partner with national groups – AP
When a group of New Orleans women chartered a private jet and flew to Washington in January imploring members of Congress to visit their hurricane-scarred city, one of their selling points was their size. A total of 140 housewives, mothers, former debutantes and successful businesswomen flew to the Capitol in a show of charm and force.
Now, the Women of the Storm are about to grow from 140 women to 300,000 nationwide, as they join hands with four national groups: the Association of Junior Leagues International, Inc., the National Council of Jewish Women, The Links Inc., and the Women’s Initiative of the United Way.

Paradox of the Perfect Girl – AlterNet
While overachieving girls are knocking on the front doors of America’s best colleges, admission officers are letting their slacker brothers slip in the back door.

Politics

Female Democrats raise funds for Casey’s Senate race – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Former Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright last night helped to raise about $100,000 for the U.S. Senate candidacy of Democratic state Treasurer Robert P. Casey Jr. at a Philadelphia event hosted by nine female Senate Democrats who described themselves as “pragmatic” and “progressive.” The invitation to the event with Ms. Albright, who served in former President Bill Clinton’s administration, was accompanied by a letter from the nine that praised Mr. Casey for his advocacy for “children, the elderly and everyday Americans who don’t have a voice.” Mr. Casey hopes to spotlight events that show support among women as the May Democratic primary draws closer. Both Mr. Casey and incumbent Republican Sen. Rick Santorum oppose abortion, while Mr. Casey’s two Democratic primary opponents — Chuck Pennacchio and Alan M. Sandals — support abortion rights.

International

U.N. misses AIDS treatment goals – UPI
The United Nations acknowledges its global HIV/AIDS treatment initiative failed to meet targets, despite an 85 percent increase in worldwide expenditures on the disease. A World Health Organization report released Tuesday in Geneva said 1.3 million people received antiretroviral treatment in 2005, up from 400,000 only two years before but still less than half of the “3 by 5” project’s goal.

WHO says few pregnant women getting HIV drugs – Reuters
Nearly 2,000 babies are born with HIV each day because their virus-infected mothers do not get the treatment needed to stop transmission, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday. The WHO said fewer than 10 percent of HIV-positive women in developing countries got antiretroviral therapy during pregnancy and childbirth between 2003 and 2005, despite a tripling of overall access to the drugs in that period.

Jail term for female foeticide – The Times of India
Five million missing girls later, the country has seen its first-ever conviction for foetal sex determination. On Tuesday, a subdivisional judicial magistrate in Haryana sentenced a doctor and his assistant to two years imprisonment and a fine of Rs 5,000 each for violating the Pre-Natal Diagnostic Technique (Regulation and Prevention of Misuse) Act, 1994. Although the Act has been in force for 12 years, this is the only such conviction. The previous one in Punjab was for improper maintenance of records and the doctor got away with a fine. Dr Anil Sabhani and his assistant Kartar Singh were caught red-handed when a team of government doctors sent three decoy patients to his clinic in Palwal, Faridabad.

UN Launches $92 Million Appeal to Stave Off New Hunger, Deaths in West Africa – UN News Service
Facing a difficult new lean season which could mean death for more than 300,000 children in four West African sub-Saharan countries unless steps are taken now, the United Nations today launched an appeal for nearly $92 million to feed one of the world’s poorest regions. “We cannot wait for thousands of people, the majority of them women and children, to die of hunger or malnutrition to react,” Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s Special Representative for West Africa, Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, said.

“I don’t want to minimize it, but if you look at the (news) coverage and the energy and the focus, etc., you would think that’s all we discussed. And let’s face it: A lot of the issues we deal with are pretty mundane but they’re fundamental – they’re making sure people are safe, we’re balancing budgets, we’re providing for education.”
–South Dakota’s Republican House Speaker Matt Michels commenting on the fact that the legislature spent no more than 15 hours discussing South Dakota’s abortion ban with no exceptions for rape and incest
Here’s my latest piece on AlterNet:

No Room in the Big Tent
Anti-abortion Republicans have a lot to celebrate. The confirmation of Samuel Alito and John Roberts, two anti-abortion Supreme Court justices, and the passage of the South Dakota law banning all abortion, have been seen as clear Republican victories. But for pro-choice Republicans, appalled and disgusted by the South Dakota law, the party ended a long time ago. While some say it’s important to speak out and fight for change, others say they’re tired of fighting a losing battle.
“I was a Republican. I did stand up. I got crucified for it and finally said, ‘To hell with it,'” says Elisabeth “Jinx” Ecke, a longtime Planed Parenthood supporter and board member in San Diego, Calif. “I’ve tried to support Republican candidates in the California Assembly, and they swear on a stack of bibles that they’ll vote pro- choice. Then they go to Sacramento and they vote anti-choice. I’m done.”

Reproductive Rights

Mississippi abortion bill dies this session – AP
A bill to ban most abortions in Mississippi died after House and Senate negotiators failed to reach a compromise before a deadline.

Anti-abortionists turn sights on schools and hospitals in US-style campaign – The Guardian
Anti-abortionists inspired by the militancy of the movement in America are adopting tactics associated with animal rights extremists in an escalating campaign of intimidation. The latest victims of harassment by a group called UK Life League are the pupils and teachers at a Catholic girls school in Surrey. The head teacher of Woldingham School, Diana Vernon, has been accused of “child abuse” for providing sex education for her 14- and 15-year-old pupils as required under the national curriculum. Activists are being encouraged to bombard Ms Vernon with hate emails.

Desperate Kenyan women risk last-resort abortions – Reuters
Turn right near the tall acacia tree at the crossroads and a narrow dirt road leads you to Mama Alice’s tin-roofed health clinic.
Mama Alice, a stout woman in her 50s, says bad things happen in the backstreets of Mukuru, a squalid shantytown that is home to about 40,000 on the outskirts of Nairobi. Many women are dying after unsafe abortions by quack doctors in the slum. Mama Alice says she treats two or three women every week for abortion-related complications.

General

Seven ages of woman – The Guardian
When does a woman turn into a feminist? Is there ever a defining moment? Feminists from their 20s to their 80s think back.

Politics

Bush’s support among women falling, poll shows – Scripps Howard
The gender gap is back. Just 30 percent of women approve of President Bush’s job performance, according to the latest Scripps Howard/Ohio University survey of 1,007 adult residents of the United States. The poll found that 44 percent of men approved of him. Overall, Bush’s approval rating was 37 percent. The gender gap is significantly larger than in previous polls.

In the Workplace

Ex-CSFB analyst claims bank pushed her into lesser posts– New York Post
An African-American Wall Street analyst with an Ivy League pedigree said financial behemoth Credit Suisse First Boston executives pushed her steadily down the corporate ladder, replacing her at each step with less experienced white men. According to an arbitration claim filed Tuesday by Anthia Christian, a former senior analyst and stock strategist CSFB, the firm waged a “campaign of pervasive racial and gender discrimination” against her. Christian, who attended Harvard Business School, is seeking over $29.2 million in damages and awards from the firm.

International

A dark season in Afghanistan – Christian Science Monitor
You have only to turn a page or two of Kabul in Winter: Life Without Peace in Afghanistan to understand that this will not be a pretty read.
Author Ann Jones begins her narrative by telling how she flew into Kabul in early 2002. (This is not a trip one sets up with a few keystrokes to Travelocity – Jones had to fly to Dubai and then wait in the airport there until a man with a briefcase briefly turned up to handwrite tickets to Kabul in exchange for hastily offered cash.) Not surprisingly, she was drawn to the plight of women, and during her time in Afghanistan she worked with different national and international organizations to improve conditions for women.

Female Genital Mutilation in Iraqi Kurdistan – Kurdish Media
FGM is a taboo in Kurdistan. In former times, people never talked about this subject. This painful mutilation is usually done to young girls aged between 4 and 12 years. It is a secret act about which people never talk. There is neither present neither party. Women want to get rid of the ‘haram’ (dirty) organs of the girl the most quickly and secretly as possible.

Italian women shun ‘mamma’ role – BBC
EU states are trying to understand why the birth rate is falling – and if anything can be done to stem the decline. All this week, the BBC News website is asking women in various countries about how they feel about being asked to have more babies, and how easy or difficult they find combining motherhood and work. Here, the BBC’s Rome correspondent Christian Fraser asks why Italy – a predominantly Roman Catholic country that has always loved children – has stopped having them.

Italian Rights Movement Nervously Awaits Election – Women’s eNews
Women’s issues and reproductive rights are a wild card in the April 9 elections in Italy, where discontent over government moves to limit abortion and civil unions smoldered until a journalist’s e-mail ignited public demonstrations.

I compile this list daily at StoriesinAmerica

“Listen, the reason I took this job is, I feel like we need to go into the 21st century. Clearly, with some folks in the country, we’re going to get there kicking and screaming.”
-Cecile Richards, the new president of Planned Parenthood
Reproductive Rights

Cecile Richards, Planned Parenthood’s Choice Leader – Washington Post
In her first week on the job, the Supreme Court agreed to decide if the first federal ban on a method of abortion is constitutional. Two weeks later, South Dakota became the first state to ban nearly all abortions and set up a challenge to Roe v. Wade . Mississippi is on the cusp of enacting a similar law. A nonprofit organization with an annual budget of $800 million, Planned Parenthood provides reproductive health care and sexual-health information to nearly 5 million women, men and teens each year, but Richards, 48, does not have a background in public health: She is a veteran Democratic political operative with Annie Lennox hair and a steely, strategic core, hired to preserve abortion rights.

Morning after in America – Washington Post
President Bush’s uneasy relationship with science and policy is about to hurt him as much as it has already hurt American women. For years now the Food and Drug Administration has failed to make the morning-after contraceptive pill, commonly known as Plan B, available over the counter. This despite numerous studies (including ones by the FDA) showing that the medication is effective and as safe as Tylenol. The result? Millions of women have been deprived of easier and cheaper access to an important product. And the agency has seriously damaged its reputation among scientists, Congress and the American public.

Time to Stall a Bush Nominee – NY Times
We don’t generally approve of holding nominations hostage to other political objectives. But Senators Hillary Clinton and Patty Murray surely have good cause to block a vote on the nomination of Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach to become commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration until the agency makes a final decision on the morning-after pill. There is no excuse for the administration’s endless obfuscation and delays on making the pill available without a prescription when the overwhelming bulk of expert opinion says it is safe to do so. The pill must be taken within 72 hours of unprotected intercourse, preferably within 24 hours, leaving little time to visit a doctor to get a prescription.

African women ask for safer abortions in Ethiopian conference – eitb24
More than 120 researchers, health-care professionals and policy makers held a three-day conference in Ethiopia to discuss ways to liberalize attitudes, laws and accessibility to safe abortions in Africa. A coalition of women’s rights groups and activists pledged Friday to do more to make safe abortions available in Africa and called for more research into unsafe abortion and maternal mortality.

Survey says parents back sex ed beyond abstinence – Express-News
As Bexar County continues to suffer one of the highest teen pregnancy rates in the nation, local health educators find themselves in the crosshairs of a passionate debate over what to teach children about preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Abstinence is the core message of all school-based sex education programs, in line with the Texas Education Code. But the state leaves it up to local school districts to decide whether to teach students about birth control and condoms, and at what grade level to introduce that information. Now, a small survey of parents from inner-city and rural areas of Bexar County has found that 80 percent of them favor teaching their children about condoms and birth control as early as the middle school years.

General

Iraqi woman’s Baghdad blog in the running for£30,000 book prize – The Guardian
An anonymous Iraqi woman has become the first blog author to be in the running for a big literary prize for a book published between hard covers. Baghdad Burning, by a 26-year-old author who has won an international readership under the pen name Riverbend, is longlisted for the £30,000 Samuel Johnson award. In the list, announced today, she is up against 18 other books including Alan Bennett’s latest bestseller, histories of the cold war and the great wall of China, and a biography of the 19th-century cookbook author Mrs Beeton. The Guardian carried an extract from Riverbend’s title last summer.

Politics

For some women, Senate choice is no choice – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
One of the more intriguing dynamics of this year’s Pennsylvania Senate race is that when faced with a Democrat and a Republican who both oppose abortion, some Democratic women are going to sit the race out. The issue was thrust to the forefront this past week when several women’s groups endorsed a virtually unknown Democrat, Alan M. Sandals, as their choice to challenge Sen. Rick Santorum, largely because Mr. Sandals supports abortion rights.

International

Healing Powers – Newsweek
African women are starting to take charge–making new laws, changing old attitudes, inspiring others to follow their lead. Who will help them mend a broken continent?

Women leaders to discuss role – Gulf Daily News
About 100 women’s leaders from 16 Arab countries will converge in Bahrain tomorrow to discuss the means of promoting their role in the region. The two-day conference will focus on the success of Arab women in the legal, economic and political fields. Participants will examine experiences in the region that reflect women’s achievements, including the role of women in family and society, women’s contribution to the economic sector and their political participation.

As outsourcing booms, now India makes babies too – GG2.net
giving birth to healthy twins, Mrs A, a young Indian woman, handed them to a US-based couple knowing she was unlikely to see them again. Her parents never knew what she was doing,” her mother-in-law confides. “She told them she had a baby boy but he passed away.” Mrs A, 27, is part of India’s most prolific family of surrogate mothers, something that although not unlawful has to be kept a secret in this conservative country.

PanAfrica: Somber Outlook On Aids – AllAfrica.com
A former director of the United Nations Commission on HIV/AIDS and Governance in Africa has painted a gloomy picture of efforts to bring the pandemic under control across the continent. “There is absolutely nothing optimistic about HIV in Africa, 25 years after the virus was discovered,” said Nana Poku, who is now a professor in the Department of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford, in the United Kingdom. “The biggest issue we fundamentally got wrong is prevention. The ABC strategy doesn’t work,” he added.