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In reason number two on why human rights are important
in responses to *** and AIDS, on page two it says:
“For many women living with *** and vulnerable to *** and AIDS,
health systems remain places of prejudice and discrimination,
rather than places of treatment and care.”
The main issue for my organization is to address
and end forced sterilization of *** positive women,
not only in South Africa, the country I live in,
but in the whole of the southern African region;
because it has turned out that this is the practice
that is prevalent in the health systems.
This is my passion as a woman living with *** because it happened to me in 1997.
I had gone to a hospital for a reproductive health service
and I was told that I would access the service only if I consent to sterilization.
I knew what my rights were, because I had been educated about my rights,
but it was like a catch-22 situation.
If I called lawyers, obviously at that point I would
have needed to look for pro bono lawyers and that would take time,
I needed this procedure to be done so I signed.
I consented to sterilization although I knew that it was like bargaining
some of my rights to access others.
Now I have access to treatment.
My situation has changed and now I feel that I am able to challenge the issue,
to claim my rights to reproductive in South African courts.
As I am doing this, I am finding more and more *** positive women
who are coming forward to say “it happened to me as well.”
I have personally documented ten cases
of *** positive women who have been forcibly sterilized in South Africa.
And I also do know that in Namibia,
fifteen *** positive women are actually taking the government to court
because they were coerced to forced sterilization.
The way to fight it is to go to court
because the South African constitution guarantees the right to reproduction
to all women and that includes women with ***.
To me litigation is an expression of anger,
of course, but it is also and advocacy strategy
to call for policy change because there is no specific policy
that is talking about sterilizations in the context of ***.
But it is also an attempt to say there has to be a constitutional court articulation
to say: this should not happen to women with *** and to other poorer women.
As I engage with this issue, you realize that it is not just happening to women with ***.
It is happening to other women as well.
It is an act of punishment and it is an act excluding
women who are poor from reproduction.
For further information on Human Rights, ***/AIDS,
and to endorse "Now More than Ever: the joint statement,"
visit www.HIVhumanRIGHTSnow.org
Transcribed by Arielle Reid Subtitled by Hunter Holliman