(9 Jan 1998) Spanish/Nat
There is growing outrage in Peru over an alleged government-backed scheme to sterilise low income women.
The government has denied that such a programme exists but there have been a number of reports of women falsely bribed into undergoing surgical sterilisation.
The women, mostly from poor and remote regions, said promises of free medicine and clothes following the operations never materialised.
Fresh controversy has broken out in Peru over an alleged mass-sterilisation campaign ordered by the government.
Media reports allege a campaign aimed to control Peru's population in the poorer regions.
Reports say operations such as this were carried out on thousands of women who had been promised, in return, free medicine and even clothes.
Four deaths have resulted from the operations which have allegedly been going on for more than two years.
There are also reports that thousands more who've been sterilised complain that the promises they received never materialised.
And many claim the government has so far turned a deaf ear to their complaints.
Ligia Rios is one of them.
SOUNDBITE: (Spanish)
"Well I accepted (the operation) because they said it is good if one is not going to have any more children, that nothing will happen to me, they would come and take me in, they would operate on me for free and on top of that they offered me free medicine. What more do I want? I accepted but it all went wrong. I thought that it was all going to be as they said, that they operate, they bring you back and nothing would go wrong and that is not the case."
SUPER CAPTION: Ligia Rios, patient
On Wednesday, Miriam Schenone, Peru's Minister for Women and Human Development, denied the existence of any mass sterilisation campaign.
The operation, as detailed in this newspaper report, involves the tying of the Fallopian tubes.
Protesters claim poor hygiene standards in the operating theatre have resulted in death.
The scale of the alleged campaign is unclear and subject to media speculation.
SOUNDBITE: (Spanish)
"But the problem which exists in day to day life is very serious. There has been a target placed, that is to say one will arrive at x number of sterilisations each year, obstetricians, nurses and doctors have been pressurised to reach their monthly quota with a number of sterilisations."
SUPER CAPTION: Susana Galdos, Manuela Ramos Fertility Movement
One newspaper puts the target at one fifth of the Peru's childbearing women.
This would be equivalent to more than 230-thousand women.
The alleged campaign has been a covert and dirty one according to opposition politicians.
SOUNDBITE: (Spanish)
"The problem is that they tell them that it is a very simple operation, which has no secondary risk for their health and that in a couple of hours they can carry on with life as normal and also, this is often a lie. They are not using adequate instruments and in some cases they take advantage of them and they tell them, as with the majority of younger women, they tell them that there is no problem, because they can reverse the operation, and they do not tell them that there is a method for sterilising and not a method for de-sterilising, that is to say that also in only two or three per cent of cases can the Fallopian tubes be untied."
SUPER CAPTION: Rafael Rey, Congressman, Renewal Party
Schenone has said the allegations have become an opportunity for the opposition to score political points against the administration.
But the scandal is fuelled mainly by civic organisations and outraged women's rights groups.
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