While President Bush campaigned for war in Afghanistan on the extremely offensive and ironic notion that it was about freeing women from the oppressive religious fundamentalist regime, little has changed along gender lines in Afghanistan. In fact, in addition to the administration's and the Republican's attacks on women's rights in the US – increased attacks on reproductive freedom, on anti-poverty and health programs that disproportionately affect women, on working families through wage cuts and benefits givebacks, on affirmative action – the administration's hatred for international institutions and its refusal to provide promised funding abroad have halted progress toward helping women and girls across the globe. As the items below indirectly show, the Bush administration's policies (as well as the likeminded anti-women fundamentalism of many regimes throughout the world that are allied with the Bush administration) threaten the lives and health of millions of women and girls.
GLOBAL CAMPAIGN FOR EDUCATION
Press Release – 8th March 2006
Millions of Girls Still Out of School on International Women's Day
To mark International Women's Day, the Global Campaign for Education (GCE) urges world leaders to take action to reverse the unacceptably slow progress on girls' education. If they continue to delay, their inaction on girls' education will mean increased poverty later and will condemn countries hard-hit by AIDS and other diseases to a grim future of underdevelopment and dependence over the next decade.
Donor representatives meet in Moscow next week to review progress of the Education For All Fast-Track Initiative, the global plan agreed in 2002 to assist countries serious about getting all girls and boys into school. GCE believes this is a key opportunity for rich countries, especially the G8 nations, to come forward with pledges to enable the Initiative to reach more countries in the coming years. Campaigners expressed disappointment that political momentum from 2005 has not yet translated into hard cash to provide teachers, books and school buildings.
"Last year the world missed the first Millennium Development Goal: to eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education by 2005," said Rasheda Choudhury, a GCE board member. "World leaders barely raise an eyebrow as millions of girls are denied life-saving education. As the representatives of rich countries gather again next week, we exhort them to take urgent action to get all girls and boys into school."
Education equips girls and women with a basic confidence in their abilities and rights, an ability to acquire and process information, and increased earning power. It costs as little as US$100 per year to provide this critical asset, and in the 21 st century there can be no excuse for 60 million girls to be denied it.
What is the Global Campaign for Education?
* The GCE is a broad coalition of development and education research agencies and unions active in over 100 countries. The GCE's aim is for every child in the world to get a quality education. Members include Oxfam, Action Aid, Education International, Save the Children, PLAN International, World Vision and the Global March Against Child Labor. For more information see:
www.campaignforeducation.org
Facts on Girls' Education
* This year alone, failure to reach the 2005 UN girls' education goal will result in over 1 million unnecessary child and maternal deaths; 10 million over a decade.
* HIV/AIDS infection rates are doubled among young people who do not finish primary school. If every girl and boy received a complete primary education, at least 7 million new cases of HIV could be prevented in a decade.
* Education is a key economic asset for individuals and for nations. Every year of schooling lost represents a 10 to 20 per cent reduction in girls' future incomes. Countries could raise per capita economic growth by about 0.3% percentage points per year – or 3 percentage points in the next decade - if they simply attained parity in girls' and boys' enrolments.
* Failure to educate girls and women perpetuates needless hunger. Gains in women's education contributed most to reducing malnutrition between 1970-1995, playing a more important role than increased food availability.
* Women with education are better able to successfully resist debilitating practices such as female genital cutting, early marriage and domestic abuse by male partners.
Women’s right to safe sexuality and to autonomy in all decisions relating to sexuality is respected almost nowhere.
As it is intimately related to economic independence, this right is most violated in those places where women exchange sex for survival as a way of life. And we are not talking about prostitution but rather a basic social and economic arrangement between the sexes which results on the one hand from poverty affecting men and women, and on the other hand, from male control over women’s lives in a context of poverty.
By and large, most men, however poor can choose when, with whom and with what protection if any, to have sex. Most women cannot.
As such, our basic premise has to be that unless and until the scope of human rights is fully extended to economic security (ie the right not to live in abject poverty in a world of immense riches), women’s right to safe sexuality is not going to be achieved.
A Minister of Health of one of the Southern African countries declared this year that women have a right to sexuality which does not endanger their lives. A guiding principle perhaps for all our work in HIV/AIDS/STI.
The major issues
* Lack of control over own sexuality and sexual relationships (see above)
* Poor reproductive and sexual health, leading to serious morbidity and mortality. Rates of infection in young (15-19) women are between 5 and 6 times higher than in young men (recent studies in various African populations)
* Neglect of health needs, nutrition, medical care etc. Women’s access to care and support for HIV/AIDS is much delayed (if it arrives at all) and limited. Family resources nearly always devoted to caring for the man. Women, even when infected themselves, are providing all the care.
* Clinical management based on research on men. This year we plan to update guidance and start with module on clinical management of HIV/AIDS in women
* All forms of coerced sex – from violent rape to cultural/economic obligations to have sex when it is not really wanted, increases risk of microlesions and therefore of STI/HIV infection.
* Harmful cultural practices: from genital mutilation to practices such as "dry" sex.
* Stigma and discrimination in relation to AIDS (and all STIs) : much stronger against women who risk violence, abandonment, neglect (of health and material needs), destitution, ostracism from family and community. Furthermore, women, are often blamed for spread of disease, always seen as the "vector" even though the majority have been infected by only partner/husband.
* Adolescents: access to education for prevention, (in and out of school and through media campaigns), condoms, and reproductive health services before and after they are sexually active. Promotion and protection of adolescent reproductive rights (particularly girls). Ostacles in terms of laws and policies, health service provision, cultural attitudes and expectations of girls and boys’ sexual behaviour, cultural practices, and educational and employment opportunities.
* Sexual abuse: there is now evidence that this is an underestimated mode of transmission of HIV infection in children (even very small children). Adult men seek ever younger female partners (younger than 15 years of age) in order to avoid HIV infection, or if already infected, in order to be "cured".
* Disclosure of status, partner notification, confidentiality. These are all more difficult issues for women than for men for the reasons discussed above - negative consequences; and the fact that women have usually been infected by their only partner/husband.
* Because disclosure is more difficult, women’s access to care and support is further decreased. VCT as an entry point for care and prevention is vital. Protection for women when they disclose status must be assured. We have this year worked intensively with UNAIDS on issues of disclosure and confidentiality. HSI produced a question and answer document which will be published shortly.
Human rights issues relating to mother to child transmission (MTCT)
* Informed consent to testing during pregnancy, to the intervention itself and to termination/continuing with the pregnancy
* Provision of adequate pre-test counselling, pre-intervention counselling/information; infant feeding counselling; contraceptive advice especially if not breastfeeding.
* Protection of confidentiality, including shared confidentiality in the interests of care and support; and the problem of not breastfeeding when this amounts to "public disclosure" of positive serostatus. Legal provisions, health service practices and community/NGO support.
* Provision of family planning services, alternative infant feeding/breastmilk substitutes, material support for fuel, water etc. in addition to the intervention itself.
* Involvement of partner/husband at all stages, positive and negative consequences.
* Potential adverse effects of taking antiretrovirals (ARVs) especially in repeat pregnancies of an HIV infected woman.
* Women’s access to care and treatment apart from the MTCT intervention, woman as vessel for the baby.
* Generation of orphans. Parents likely to die. On mother’s death, baby’s survival chances much reduced. Should woman herself be treated, at least for common HIV related illness.
* Selection of women to benefit from MTCT.
