Men may soon have new options for safe and effective male contraceptives, such as a birth control pill, a patch, or an implant. According to MSNBC, researchers have had much success over the last five years with testing male hormonal contraceptives (MHC) and a daily pill could be available in five to seven years, with […]
A Michigan health department serving four counties overcharged low-income women for birth control and falsified records to hide the charges, according to a report by the state’s Office of Audit. The health department provides services with money from federal grants, local tax revenue, and third-party insurers. Services are supposed to be available on a sliding […]
In an effort to promote safe sex and reduce the infection rate of HIV, the Botswana government has launched an initiative to promote the female condom. The Joint UN Program on HIV/AIDS, UNAIDS, has estimated that 140,000 of Botswana’s 1.8 million citizens are infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. While the government has […]
In response to a front-page New York Times article from one year ago, which alleged that women students at elite schools will choose a family and motherhood over a career, Victoria Brescoll, a postdoctoral research fellow at Yale, conducted a study to determine true attitudes of women and men students regarding their future careers and […]
The United Nations released a report late last week officially classifying violence against women as a human rights violation, increasing pressure on states in the UN to intensify and improve systems in place for handling violence against women. Calling violence against women “unacceptable,” the report goals included: to survey the pervasiveness of violence against women […]
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear several contentious cases during its current term, including two cases considering the constitutionality of the so-called “partial-birth” abortion ban passed by Congress and signed by President Bush in November of 2003. This abortion procedures ban has been ruled unconstitutional by lower courts in California, Nebraska, and New York […]
The Indonesian government announced this week that it is prohibiting doctors and nurses from performing female genital cutting. According to Reuters, some Indonesian groups encourage families to perform female genital mutiliation, allegedly to maintain chastity and virginity before marriage and to ensure faithfulness in the women’s marriage. Sri Hermiyanti, head of the Indonesian health ministry’s […]
Two fatal school shootings in the past week share a disquieting common factor: the shooters singled out girls. In Monday’s shooting in an Amish schoolhouse, the gunman sent boys and adults outside before shooting girls execution-style; last week in Colorado, a man took hostage and sexually assaulted six female high school students, killing one. Targeting […]
The Sexuality Information and Education Council of the US (SIECUS) released its fourth annual review yesterday of a selection of federally funded abstinence-only education programs. The reviews found that “the curricula are riddled with messages of fear and shame, gender stereotypes, and medical misinformation that put young people at risk.” SIECUS reviewed three abstinence-only curricula […]
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) introduced the Compassionate Assistance for Rape Emergencies (CARE) Act in the Senate last week. The CARE Act (SB 3945) would require hospitals to routinely offer emergency contraception (EC) and post-exposure treatment for sexually transmitted infections to sexual assault victims. According to the bill, between 25,000 and 32,000 rape and incest […]
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) ruled yesterday that some nurses who are responsible for assigning tasks to other hospital employees will be considered supervisors under federal law, thus unable to join a labor union. The case involved a dispute at Oakwood Heritage Hospital outside of Detroit, Michigan. The hospital argued that two-thirds of the […]
US Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) made comments yesterday about the Taliban’s extensive presence in Afghanistan, the unlikelihood that the war against the Taliban could be won militarily, and the need to incorporate “people who call themselves the Taliban” into the Afghan government. Frist said to the Associated Press during a visit with Senator […]
Iran announced its decision to submit a film that defends women’s rights to compete in the foreign film category of the Oscars. The film, written by women’s rights advocate Kambosia Partovi, is about a widowed woman working to keep up her late husband’s restaurant while deflecting her brother-in-law’s requests to marry her, following the tradition […]
A recent study of 1,100 pregnant women in the United Kingdom finds that pregnant women are not receiving adequate support in the workplace. The Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) and Tommy’s Baby Charity, an organization which promotes safe and healthy pregnancies, conducted the survey to assess attitudes and experiences of women during pregnancy. The research showed […]
Los Angeles fire captain Alicia Mathis filed a complaint against her department last week, claiming gender discrimination, a hostile work environment, and harassment. According to the Los Angeles Times, this could be the first class-action lawsuit brought by female firefighters against the department. In front of the Los Angeles City Hall, Mathis recalled her experiences, […]
The impact of the widely reported scandal involving former Representative Mark Foley continues to grow. The scandal not only involves House Republican leadership, and what they knew and when they knew it, but it may also involve the executive branch. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) sent a letter to the Inspector General […]
Democratic leadership in the Senate blocked the Teen Endangerment Act, officially known as the Child Interstate Abortion Act, late Friday night when Republicans were unable to obtain the 60 votes required to move to a vote. The bill would have criminalized the transportation of a minor across state lines to obtain an abortion by anyone […]
Federal Judge Susan Dlott ruled last week that an Ohio law that restricted a physician’s ability to prescribe mifepristone (also known as RU486) for a medical abortion is unconstitutional. Under the Ohio law, physicians in Ohio would have been unable to prescribe mifepristone after 49 days of gestation or in any other dose other than […]
The Army has brought charges against military police officer Suzanne Swift because she has refused to do another tour of duty in Iraq after being sexually harassed during her first stay. Swift has reported sexual abuse and harassment by three noncommissioned officers during her time in the military; two of these reported incidents occurred while […]
College students engaged in a sit-in on Tuesday in Washington, DC to protest the discrimination against lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals in the military. Students from the University of Maryland, American University, and George Washington University organized at a military recruiting center in downtown DC to protest Public Law 103-160, which is also known as […]
