SAVING WOMEN'S LIVES
Women as Refugees

Responding to the grave health emergency now facing Afghan women, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA link ) is mounting its largest-ever humanitarian operation. According to UNFPA's press release link on September 28, the agency is asking international donors for $4.5 million to support the effort. Thousands of pregnant women are among the Afghan civilians who have fled their homes in recent days and are massed along the country's borders. The lack of shelter, food and medical care, and unsanitary conditions pose a serious risk to these women and their infant children. "When it comes to access to nutrition during a crisis, we've seen studies that show that women and, of course, children suffer more in comparison to men," said Roxanna Bonnell, a public health expert at the New York-based Open Society Institute link, in a September 30 story by Women's Enews link. "Men tend to gain first access to nutritional resources and women get whatever is left over." Other UN divisions that called for support for Afghan women and children include UNICEF link and UNHCR link.

In an email to ABC News link on September 17, an Afghan woman who called herself Mehmooda, a member of the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA link ), a grassroots pro-democracy group that provides education, healthcare and economic opportunity to Afghan women, wrote, "If life in Afghanistan has been bleak since the Taliban took power in 1996, its confrontation with the United States promises to make things worse still for the millions of ordinary Afghans who struggle each day just to survive." She added, "According to people who crossed into Pakistan, thousands of people who can't pay that much money are waiting on the border with their children." The Washington Post link also covered Afghan women on September 24.

The call to help aid Afghan women and children was supported by Mavis Leno, chair of the Feminist Majority's Campaign to Stop Gender Apartheid in Afghanistan. In an interview with USA Today link on September 27, Leno said, "I would like Americans to call in to our State Department and ask them to deal with this situation humanely. Punish the people who deserve to be punished. Don't harm thousands of innocent people." She was also interviewed on CNN's Larry King Live link on September 26.

[NOTE: See PLANetWIRE.org's feature story on "Saving Women's Lives in Afghanistan link."

Solutions for Women: Education

In Malawi, authorities are battling to keep young girls in school. A September 27 story disseminated by Africa News link quoted Kuthemba Mwale, Director for Education, Planning, Policy and Budget: "Girls opt for early marriages. As a poor country, Malawi is experiencing a great deal of girls who drop out from school because they are enticed by men to marry or because they get pregnant." He said girls accounted for the majority of Malawi's 18 percent drop-out rate in its primary schools, one of the highest in the southern African region. HIV/AIDS has contributed, he said: "The HIV pandemic has taken away most breadwinners in most families. Consequently, girls take care of their families more than boys." At a seminar in Pakistan on "Role of Women in the Freedom Movement," organized by the Institute of Women Development Studies, Mazhar-ul-Haq Siddiqui, the vice chancellor of Sindh University in Jamshoro, Pakistan, said it was the responsibility of scholars to create awareness among women to solve their problems, according to a September 21 story by The Business Recorder. He also emphasized "the need for greater concentration on uplifting women of rural areas," because "the majority of them have no knowledge about their rights." A September 24 story by Women's Enews link stressed that global education of girls is the key to development: "The world over, schooling girls makes economic sense. A similar increase in the number of boys finishing secondary school doesn't yield the same returns, according to UNFPA. Part of the reason is that women are more likely to invest in their children's health and education, further boosting economic growth."

HIV/AIDS

Although Brazil, Latin America's largest country, has one of the most progressive anti-AIDS programs in the world, women -- and housewives in particular - are becoming infected at an alarming rate, in part because of cultural norms favoring sensuality and male chauvinism, according to a September 30 story in The Washington Post link. "One of our biggest enemies in AIDS prevention is machismo," said Paulo Roberto Teixeira, secretary of Brazil's AIDS program. "We need to empower women, especially those living in poverty, who have even less ability to negotiate sex with their partners. But we also need to educate wives of all classes, who often don't see themselves with any risk factor. The solution will go hand in hand with feminism and women's liberation. It is the only way."

AIDS was found to be the leading cause of death in South Africa, according to a report titled "The Impact of HIV/AIDS on Adult Mortality in South Africa" by the Medical Research Council (MRC link) of South Africa. About 40 percent of South Africans aged 15 to 49 who died last year died of AIDS related illnesses, said the MRC report link, as reported by The Sunday Times link (South Africa) on September 16. If the epidemic goes unchecked, the number of AIDS-related deaths could rise to twice the number of all other causes of death in the country combined and could bring population growth to a halt, the report said. This story was also reported by the Associated Press link and Agence France Presse on September 16.

In an effort to combat rising HIV/AIDS infections in Swaziland, a small, impoverished and landlocked kingdom between South Africa and Mozambique, King Mswati III announced on Sept. 9 the reinstatement of the traditional chastity rite of umchwasho. Under the tradition, put in place for the next five years, all unmarried girls under the age of 18 must wear the multicolored, woven scarves signaling they are not to be touched by men. The Associated Press reported on September 30 that nearly three weeks later, two scarfless teen-age schoolgirls waited for a bus on the streets of the capital, Mbabane, and openly questioned their ruler's edict. "Five years is too much," said Siphiwe Nkosi, a 14-year-old wearing a maroon school uniform. "If they had said two years, we could have observed the tradition." Reuters link also ran a September 18 story on this event.

Agricultural output from small-scale farmers in Zimbabwe may have fallen by as much as 50 percent over the past five years, mainly as a result of the AIDS pandemic, the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO link ) said in its latest report link. A September 28 story by Africa News link said that according to the FAO report, overall agricultural production in 1999 failed to keep up with population growth for the third consecutive year, rising by only 2.1 percent while population growth was 2.5 percent. Preliminary estimates for 2000 were that agricultural production would only increase by 0.5 percent.

ENVIRONMENT: FOOD SECURITY

According to the U.N. World Food Program (WFP link), more than 1.5 million people in Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador have been affected by drought, nearly 700,000 of them farmers who lost half to all of their crops. The Washington Times reported on September 17 that at least 50 malnutrition deaths, many of them children, have been reported in the area along Guatemala's border with Honduras. In Chiquimula province, the town of Camotan alone has reported 41 deaths in the past eight months, and doctors say malnutrition is to blame for many other deaths where the cause is listed as "headache" or something else. Other areas affected by drought include Sri Lanka, Iran and Ethiopia link. The Associated Press link reported on September 20, that Sri Lanka, known for its lush jungles and tea plantations, made a surprise international appeal in August for $700,000 in aid to feed 300,000 drought victims. Since then, the government has said 1.5 million are affected by drought in seven southeastern districts. "Of the 411,000 people directly hurt by the drought in Hambantota, 48,000 are children," said Ananda Amaratunga, District Secretary of the region. The Secretary noted that Sri Lanka has an agriculture-based economy, and when so many crops are lost, "it not only affects the economy of the district, but of the entire country." Drought has also affected Iran's economy. A United Nations report pegged losses for the first six months of this year at $2.6 billion. The report said the drought last year forced Iran, with more than 70 million people, to become the world's largest importer of wheat - seven million tons - and the situation is still worse this year, according to The New York Times link on September 18.

GLOBAL POPULATION COVERAGE

Pakistan and UNFPA link on Tuesday signed three projects totaling $3.451 million for achieving better family health services, especially for women and children. The Business Recorder link (Pakistan) reported on September 19 that the projects are for promoting intervention for safe motherhood, managing information for better family health, and strengthening quality and supervision of family health workers. Agence France Presse reported on September 20 that Kenya will host international talks September 24-28 aimed at improving reproductive health in Africa and the eastern Mediterranean. Only 10 percent of the world's women live in Africa and the eastern Mediterranean but they suffer 40 percent of all pregnancy-related deaths, the World Health Organization (WHO link) said. The meeting sponsored by WHO, World Bank link and various other UN agencies is expected to take stock of what scientists have achieved in the two regions and to seek solutions to reproductive health problems based on sound scientific research. Also, The New Vision link (Uganda) reported on September 22 on that the European Union will spend 3.5 billion Uganda shillings (about U.S. $2 million) to improving sexual and reproductive health in eight districts in northern Uganda.

OPINIONS AND EDITORIALS

In light of the September 11 terrorist attack, opinion pieces and editorials continue to reflect on the underlying causes of terrorism, saying those are U.S. foreign policy and abuse of human rights. However, on September 27, The Indianapolis Star link ran an opinion piece by Ruth Holladay that opened with the question: "Was it really a good idea for Planned Parenthood of New York City, in the wake of more than 6,000 deaths in Manhattan, to offer free reproductive services, including abortions, to frightened women?" She then targeted UNFPA's new campaign to aid Afghan women by noting, "UNFPA has opportunistically turned natural disasters and wars into chances to pass out 'reproductive health kits' in refugee camps." Holladay concluded, "If we truly want to defeat the culture of death, we must be responsibly in favor of life -- not self-serving, theatrical or promotional, but genuinely concerned for each other. And of course, that concern must extend to the unborn."

Time Magazine link ran an October 1 opinion piece by rabbi Michael Lerner, editor of TIKKUN Magazine link: A Jewish Critique of Politics, Culture and Society. In it he wrote, "We are naive to think we can rid ourselves of this form of evil [terrorism] till we confront the deeper realities that produce it." He added, "If we want to be effective in a long-term struggle against terror, we need a strategy to marginalize the terrorists by making it much harder for them to appeal to legitimate anger at the U.S. Imagine if the bin Ladens and other haters of the world had to recruit people against the U.S. at a time when: The U.S. was using its economic resources to end world hunger and redistribute the wealth of the planet so that everyone had enough; The U.S. was the leading voice championing an ethos of generosity, leading the world in ecological responsibility, social justice and openhearted treatment of minorities, and rewarding people and corporations for social responsibility; and The U.S. was restructuring its internal life so that all social practices, corporations and institutions were being judged not only on whether they maximized profit but also to the extent that they maximized love and caring, sensitivity and an approach to the universe based on awe and wonder at the grandeur of creation."

In another opinion piece that ran in Newsday link on September 20, Jamie F. Metzl, former National Security Council and State Department official, asserted that "President George W. Bush and his Administration's unilateralist approach to foreign policy that has isolated America and alienated our allies" was one of the underlying causes for the terrorist attack. He also echoed Lerner's Time piece by offering a similar solution: "One major step toward limiting the terrorist recruitment pool is working with our allies even harder to promote development and basic education in the poorest parts of the world."

An added dimension to the complexity of the U.S.-led international coalition against terrorism is potential humanitarian disaster. A Financial Times link September 25 editorial warned that the UN predicted "more than 5 million people in Afghanistan face an increasing danger of starvation." The editorial emphasized, "The high probability that vital food aid would continue to be blocked should not be dismissed as 'collateral damage'. In planning its strike against terrorists, the United States must therefore think simultaneously of ways to resume the supply of food, particularly in the north and west where starvation is most imminent."

OF SPECIAL INTEREST

A number of NGOs have been wondering about the appropriate time to pitch stories to the press in light of the September 11 events. The Wall Street Journal link's September 27 article titled, "In Attacks' Wake, PR Firms Find Their Pitches Fall Flat" may be of special interest. 

The above analysis was written by Elena M. H. Cabatu and Kathy Bonk at the Communications Consortium Media Center, 1200 New York Avenue, NW, Suite 300, Washington, DC 20005, 202/326-8700.

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