Category: health issues

500 British girls have genitals mutilated every year

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update March 25th:   I thought the British number was high, but here is an article from NYC that says our cases of female genital mutilation are much higher, and we are doing less about it.

 

That is a staggering number.    And, you can bet it’s happening here too in the secretive Somali Muslim communities in cities such as Minneapolis, Seattle, Nashville, Boston, San Diego and so on.

The article, from The Times, tells us that British health authorities are promoting a campaign to reach Somalis and other immigrants from the Horn of Africa  to have the gruesome operation reversed.  It would be done free as part of their nationalized health care sytem.  Hat tip Blulitespecial.  Gosh, just think taxpayers here could be paying for similar operations in years ahead if Obama gets his way.

The NHS is to advertise free operations to reverse female circumcisions, with experts warning that each year more than 500 British girls have their genitals mutilated.

Despite having been outlawed in 1985, female circumcision is still practised in British African communities, in some cases on girls as young as 5. Police have been unable to bring a single prosecution even though they suspect that community elders are being flown from the Horn of Africa to carry out the procedures.

The advertisement will appear from next month on a Somali satellite TV station much viewed in Britain.

What is female genital mutilation?  We have loads of posts on the subject in our health issues category, but it’s important to remind readers again.

Female circumcision, which is done for various reasons, such as religious and cultural traditions, can cause severe health complications including infections and psychological problems. The procedure, predominantly carried out on girls aged between 5 and 12, can range from the removal of the clitoris to the removal of all the exterior parts of the vagina, which is then sewn up.

To understand it fully, I recommend you read Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s book, Infidel, in which she describes how the procedure traumatized her and her sister.

Agency for Culture Change Management UK?   I wonder when we will get one of those.

Sarah McCulloch, of the Agency for Culture Change Management UK, said that every year more than 500 British girls were having circumcisions. “A lot of them are done in the UK, but some still travel overseas,” she said.

She said that a code of silence in Britain’s African communities had allowed circumcisions to continue and prevented arrests. The unqualified female elders, known as “house doctors” because they act in secret in a family home, are flown into the country.

It is supposedly a cultural (cultural relativism is crap) and religious (Islamic) obligation which destroys the sex drive and helps assure men get their sexual pleasure but that their women then don’t stray too far.  But it does more than that, it is the worst form of child abuse wrapped in a veil of secrecy often dooming girls to a lifetime of pain and psychological trauma.

Ms McCulloch said that girls were brainwashed into believing circumcision to be a cultural, and, in some cases, religious obligation that should be kept secret. “It is something they simply do not discuss — if they do they’d be seen as betraying their family and their community and culture,” she said. “I know many girls who want to accuse their parents but can’t. They don’t want to take their parents to court.”

In the US, refugee resettlement workers know this is happening and I sure hope they are brave enough to blow the whistle, but I doubt it.

Books to read:    It’s a long time since we wrote about this, but I recommend especially to our female readers three books that I found very informative about Islam.  I call them ‘my women’s books,’  one is Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s that I mentioned above.  The other two are Nonie Darwish, “Now they call me Infidel,” and Brigitte Gabriel, “Because they Hate: A survivor of Islamic Terror warns America.”

Hirsi Ali grew up in Africa, Darwish in Egypt, and Gabriel in Lebanon, so they give you a multi-country/continent view of Islam and what it means to be female in that male-dominated Islamic political and religious society.

Children’s Health Insurance law includes funds for legal immigrant children

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

We missed this story last week.   Hat tip to Joyce today for tipping me off.

President Barack Obama’s administration has brought to Washington a new attitude toward the issue of immigration, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said Thursday.

In comments to a small group of Hispanic journalists, Emanuel cited Wednesday’s ceremony where Obama signed into law a bill reauthorizing the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.

The chief of staff pointed out that the law increases the number of youngsters covered by SCHIP, as the program is known, from 7 million to 11 million, including – for the first time – children of legal immigrants.

More immigrant goodies on the way?

The expansion of SCHIP to immigrants’ children represents “an advance” on what the Obama administration plans to do on behalf of immigrants during the next four years, Emanuel said.

Immigrant with TB ordered isolated in Illinois

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The story is short, so far.   An immigrant (likely a refugee) from Congo has been ordered by a judge to wear a GPS tracking device and not leave home for 30 days.  He has already infected his girl friend.   Hat tip:  Blulitespecial

CHAMPAIGN, Illinois — A tuberculosis patient who failed to take precautions to avoid spreading the illness will be tracked by GPS and could go to jail if he violates court orders requiring him to remain isolated.

Champaign County Circuit Judge John Kennedy imposed those conditions Tuesday on 20-year-old Clasance Botembe, who is originally from Congo.

Health officials and prosecutors say Botembe failed to take precautions to avoid spreading the disease. Court records say his girlfriend got TB after being exposed to him.

Botembe is being treated at home. He, the judge and others wore masks during the hearing.

Botembe will be isolated for 30 days. He could be charged with a Class A misdemeanor if he defies the judge’s order.

Since we are allowing refugees to enter the US with Tuberculosis, I expect we will be hearing of more such cases.

Here is a list of all the posts we have written that involve refugees and tuberculosis.  For a variety of health issues involving refugees see our Health issues category.

Khat: our next drug problem?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

The drug beloved of Somalis and other immigrant groups rated an article in the L.A. Times over the weekend, Khat — is it more coffee or cocaine?  The message:

For centuries the “flower of paradise” has been used legally in East Africa and the Arabian Peninsula as a stimulant and social tonic.

But in the United States khat is illegal, and an increased demand for the plant in cities such as Washington and San Diego is leading to stepped up law enforcement efforts and escalating clashes between narcotics officers and immigrants who defend their use of khat as a time-honored tradition.

Of course the Khat users invoke the sacred idea of diversity to push their case.

“It is a very touchy subject. Some people see it like a drug; some people see it like coffee,” said Abdulaziz Kamus, president of the African Resource Center in Washington, D.C. “You have to understand our background and understand the significance of it in our community.”

Oh well then. What about cultures that use hashish? Shall we legalize marijuana and hashish for them? And those coca leaf chewers of South America: let’s legalize cocaine.

Some claim it’s like coffee — it makes people alert. But others think it’s less benign.

A World Health Organization report found that consumption can lead to increased blood pressure, insomnia, anorexia, constipation and general malaise. The report also said that khat can be addictive and lead to psychological and social problems.

“It is not coffee. It is definitely not like coffee,” said Garrison Courtney, spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration. “It is the same drug used by young kids who go out and shoot people in Africa, Iraq and Afghanistan. It is something that gives you a heightened sense of invincibility, and when you look at those effects, you could take out the word ‘khat’ and put in ‘heroin’ or ‘cocaine’.”

Khat is illegal in the United States, but not in the United Kingdom where it was decided the evidence didn’t warrant banning it. But there are other problems than medical ones:

The plant’s cost has been linked to family problems, including domestic abuse, said Starlin Mohamud, a Somali immigrant who is completing a dissertation on khat at San Diego State University.

In fact, within the East African community in the U.S., there are many who welcome the khat restrictions.

“I have seen what it does,” Mohamud said. “Families who are trying to make ends meet on a daily basis cannot afford it. It just creates so many problems between a husband and wife to the point where a broken family is going to be the result.”

Ann posted in November about a large shipment of Khat intercepted in Nashville. She quoted from the article:

Police said money used from khat sales often goes to pay for vehicles used in car bombs and other forms of terrorist attacks.

Just another one of the cultural wonders we get from the Somali refugees, courtesy of the State Department.

Chicago Health Center caters only to refugees

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Here is a story yesterday from the Chicago Tribune:

Differences in culture, religion and language pose daily challenges at the West Rogers Park health center, where the waiting room might find Iraqis standing next to refugees from Myanmar, or Burundis sitting alongside Somalis and Bhutanese.

On a recent snowy, bitterly cold day, 77 refugees from various countries were treated at the clinic. Among the patients seen by Dr. Gary Kaufman, the clinic’s medical director, were two young sisters from Myanmar who needed immunizations and a 55-year-old man, also from Myanmar, who needed a checkup after recent heart surgery.

I wonder who paid for the heart surgery?   Guess these poor people have health care.

Since 1975, about 130,000 refugees have resettled in the Chicago area, and many pass through the doors of the Touhy clinic, which opened in the early 1970s. Except for the physicians, the staff members are themselves former refugees.

The health center is bracing for a new wave of clients this year, as Illinois expects an increase in refugees moving to the state, and most are headed to Chicago. In 2007, Illinois resettled 1,877 refugees. Last year, it was 2,412. By the end of September, an estimated 2,800 more are expected.

Refugees often land at the Touhy clinic shortly after they arrive because they are required to undergo a health assessment. But some of the center’s patients choose to get their primary care there long after they have met federal government requirements.

Most new arrivals in the Chicago area are Iraqi, Bhutanese and Burmese (from Myanmar, formerly known as Burma), said Marie Jochum, case manager for the refugee resettlement program at Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Chicago.

Looks like the taxpayers of the US pay a big chunk of the cost of running this clinic.

Common health problems among the refugees include diabetes, high blood pressure, tuberculosis, hepatitis B, post-traumatic stress disorder and poor nutrition.

All disabled refugees are referred to Touhy because of its relationship to Sinai’s Schwab Rehabilitation Hospital, Silverman said.

In fiscal year 2008, Mt. Sinai spent more than $700,000 running the center and received about $322,000 from a government grant earmarked for refugees.

I don’t know the answer, so someone please tell me.  Can a poor 55-year-old American man living in say rural America get heart surgery paid by the taxpayer?    If so, why all the hoopla about health care?

Note also that TB is being treated here.   We have reported on many previous occasions that refugees are entering the US with tuberculosis.  One Somali man died of TB working in a Tyson’s meat packing plant in Emporia, KS a couple of years ago. The mainstream media told you all about the American guy with TB flying internationally, but I bet you never heard a word about this Somali refugee dying with it in Kansas.

To add a little humor (I suppose it’s funny to some) to this story the reporter tells us about cultural differences that make treating women from Muslim countries more challenging.

Gittler recalled treating a Muslim woman who had been living in a Kenyan refugee camp for a number of years.

The Arabic interpreter at Touhy is a man, and he translated for the patient while standing behind a screen that shielded the woman. But it wasn’t easy.

The woman was an amputee, and at one point Gittler needed the translator to ask the woman if it was OK to lift her skirt and look at the site of her amputated limb. The woman needed to be fitted with a prosthetic leg—and the prosthetist also was a man. [End of story, we never learn if they managed to get her skirt up!]

If you are interested in more information on refugee health issues, visit our category on the topic here.   To date we have 75 posts on the subject.