Six women and girls who were disfigured by brutal acid attacks returned home to Bangladesh today after nine months of plastic surgery.
The free medical services were provided by Spain’s Corporacion Dermoestica, which provided help to 20 women and girls who suffered acid attacks at the hands of their husband, spurned suitors, and family foes. One of those patients, 12-year-old Monsammat Monira, had surgery to reconstruct her eyelids, neck, nose lips an ear. Married at 10, Monira’s husband doused her with acid because he was dissatisfied with the dowry her family paid him.
UNICEF’s office in Dhaka reported 200 acid attacks last year, up from 130 in 1997. The agency expects that the actual number of attacks is much higher than is reported. Two months ago, UNICEF and several private groups pooled their resources to create the Acid Survivors Foundation, which will seek to better aid acid attack survivors.
