African women with HIV “˜coerced into sterilisation’

The Guardian – Women in Africa are being sterilised without their consent after being told the procedure is a routine treatment for Aids, a lawsuit will claim.Forty HIV-positive women in Namibia have been made infertile against their will, according to the International Community of Women Living with HIV/Aids (ICW). The group is preparing to sue the Namibian government over at least 15 cases.Campaigners also report coerced sterilisation in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zambia and South Africa, where according to one report a 14-year-old girl was told she could have an abortion only on condition that she agreed to sacrifice her reproductive rights.Read Article

Tags: Africa, disease & medicine, gender & sexuality, human rights, population