Internat'l Women’s Day Takes On Special Meaning in Larchmont

by Fran Snedeker

(March 15, 2007) Bigger than either Mothering Day or Mother’s Day, International Women’s Day is celebrated on March 8th all over the world. And this year it was celebrated in Larchmont as well. Upwards of 30 people – mostly from the local community – gathered in a Larchmont home for a colloquy about strategies for enhancement of women’s rights in developing countries.

The presenters included EngenderHealth country directors from Ethiopia, Uganda and India who had come to New York for other meetings related to improving women’s health care in some of the poorest corners of the world. By evening’s end, the Larchmont group had gained perspective on the import of International Women’s Day in each of these developing countries.

The stories contained common threads despite the diversity of cultures. Women in these male-dominated countries are the neediest - economically and medically. Deprived of education, they enter marriage early and experience frequent pregnancies while their bodies are still developing.

Jyoti Vajpayee, M.D, of India shared her insights about the nexus of women’s rights and economic development using the surging HIV/AIDS epidemic in her country as a poignant example. India, she observed, has enjoyed in recent decades remarkable economic growth. But “social development has not kept pace with economic development.

Women line up for prenatal visits at a district hospital in Rajasthan, India.

"So we have two Indias: one India which is shiny and one India which is in the shadows,” she said. Among those in the "‘shadows" are the 5.2 million Indians living with HIV/AIDS more than one-third of whom are very young women who typically have never had sex with anyone but their husband. Many others have been driven to prostitution (and inevitably to HIV/AIDS) by desperation – starvation when the rains fail, destitution due to family illness.

Traditionally, Dr. Vajpayee said, these women have been told by health care workers: “You have one foot in the grave. No more sex – you will just spread your nasty disease. No more children – they will just add to the burden of HIV-positive orphans in our institutions. If you are pregnant, get an abortion. If not, get your tubes tied.”

More recently, the Indian government has switched away from this “pragmatic” approach, that was failing to combat the HIV/AIDS scourge, and has made anti-retroviral drugs available free for all afflicted by the disease. But without systematic changes to attitudes of both caretakers and patients, the drugs were gathering dust on the shelves. According to Dr. Vajpayee, EngenderHealth programs have been able to establish links between governmental bureaucrats, hospital/clinic personnel and village leaders. And now "Chitra, Githa and Pushba" are unafraid to step forward and receive medicines essential to enhancing and extending their lives, so they can continue as contributing members of society.

Without this sort of initiative, Dr. Vajpayee said, “HIV can destroy India.” India’s highly productive workforce is the youngest in the world. But HIV/AIDS affects the young – and especially young women – disproportionately. So “economic development is going to be cut like a hot knife through butter if we don’t turn this epidemic around.”

At the Women's Day gathering in Larchmont are (l-r): EngenderHealth Ethiopia Director Dr. Gelila Kidane; Uganda Director Julie Wilshire; former EngenderHealth board member Fran Snedeker; India Director Dr. Jyoti Vajpayee.

Similar roadmaps to the enhancement of women’s rights were offered by Gelila Kidane Goba, M.D, the EngenderHealth country director in Ethiopia and Julie Wiltshire, a nurse practitioner and country director in Uganda. Dr. Goba observed that American political advocacy and foreign aid has had a huge influence on the course of development and the well-being of women in the poorest corners of the world.

Larchmont's Lynn Reichgott (left) at the Women's Day event with Westchester County Legislator Judy Myers (far right) and Mamaroneck resident Anne Herman.

Larchmont resident Lynn Reichgott said that it was “painful listening to you [country representatives] and hearing some of your stories, and also exhilarating to hear what you are doing to help.”

Reflecting on the evening, County Legislator Judy Myers posited that we in Westchester County face many of the same medical challenges - complications of pregnancy, HIV/AIDS, teen pregnancy - and what she heard from EngenderHealth gave her a new perspective on the work we have before us locally.

Fran Snedeker, a former board member of EngenderHealth, is the moderator/producer of Future Choices, an LMC-TV production “pursuing reproductive health for women everywhere.”

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