Uganda – Family Medical Point rescues Kigungu women from death caused by unsafe abortions

NELSON MANDELA | PML Daily Reporter
March 10, 2024

ENTEBBE – Namakula Josephine is a sex worker in Kigungu landing site, Entebbe. She says in 2023, a client deliberately broke a condom thereby impregnating her.

As a poor lady, she was advised by a friend to use herbal medicine to remove the unwanted baby because she couldn’t raise money for a safe abortion. Little did she know this could cost her life.

“I got a lot of complications, bled a lot, and even some foetus parts remained inside which started rotting,” she narrated.

Continued:  https://www.pmldaily.com/news/2024/03/celebrating-a-woman-family-medical-point-rescues-kigungu-women-from-death-caused-by-unsafe-abortions.html


Ugandan Women Risk Their Lives to Access Abortion

“Many girls are dying because we have chosen to ignore them.”

Friday, 8 March, 2024
Culton Scovia Nakamya

For Jovia (not her real name), 2023 was the worst year of her life. The 20-year-old business student was gang-raped at a drunken house party in the Kampala suburb of Kansanga and six weeks later realised that she was pregnant.

“I wondered what I am going to tell my parents. For God’s sake, I am just in my second semester of year one, and I didn’t know who did it,” she said.

Her options were limited, as abortion is illegal in Uganda except under rare circumstances. She confided in a female friend, who suggested they visit the Kampala suburb of Nakulabye, an area known as a hub of clinics that administer clandestine abortions, mostly to students.

Continued: https://iwpr.net/global-voices/ugandan-women-risk-their-lives-access-abortion


Uganda – The Sabotage Movie Premiere: A Film with a Social Cause

JAVIRA SSEBWAMI | PML Daily Staff
February 16, 2024

The long-awaited premiere of Sabotage took place last night at the Century Cinemax Acacia Mall in an elegant affair attended by players in Uganda’s arts industry, representatives from development organisations, celebrities and film enthusiasts.

Brought to life by Reach A Hand Uganda (RAHU) in partnership with Sauti+ Media Hub and Nabwiso Films, the film is directed by Mathew Nabwiso and stars Stella Natumbwe, Sharifa Ali, Jjemba Dean Austin, Denid Kinan and others in a rollercoaster drama set around a traditional wedding (‘kwanjula’) exploring sexual violence, abortion and tradition to raise awareness around Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights (SRHR) in Uganda.

Continued: https://www.pmldaily.com/features/entertainment/2024/02/the-sabotage-movie-premiere-a-film-with-a-social-cause.html


Uganda – Local NGO comes to rescue of sex workers living on Lake Victoria landing sites

PML Daily
January 20, 2024

ENTEBBE – Reports of injuries and illnesses resulting from unsafe abortion complications among sex workers living on Lake Victoria landing sites are unacceptably high, placing a huge healthcare burden not only on individual patients and their families but also on the national healthcare system, which is already burdened with other morbidities.

On a sadder note, many of those who suffer these complications lose lives because they cannot afford or quickly access Post Abortion Care (PAC) depending on where they are offered.

Continued: https://www.pmldaily.com/news/2024/01/local-ngo-comes-to-rescue-of-sex-workers-living-on-lake-victoria-landing-sites.html


Uganda – Health service providers urged to extend post-abortion care without fear

NELSON MANDELA | PML Daily
December 3, 2023

KAMPALA – Health service providers in both public and private facilities have been urged to provide Post Abortion Care (PAC) without fear because it is fully provided for in the Ministry of Health standards and guidelines.

The call was made by Dr. Othman Kakaire – Executive Director of the Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists of Uganda (AOGU).

Continued: https://www.pmldaily.com/features/health/2023/12/health-service-providers-urged-to-extend-post-abortion-care-without-fear.html


Uganda – Abortion-associated stigma affecting access to Post-Abortion Care – MOH

The Independent
September 30, 2023

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | While the government has put in place medical care services to support mothers who need post-abortion care in all healthcare centers, the Ministry of Health reveals that many of them still die due to complications without seeking help.

Speaking at a press conference on Friday, Dr. Charles Olaro, the Director of Curative Services in the Health Ministry revealed that despite awareness efforts about the availability of such services that help women battling complications post-abortion, many still end up in the medical ward even when they turn up to hospitals because they provide wrong information to health workers.

Continued: https://www.independent.co.ug/abortion-associated-stigma-affecting-access-to-post-abortion-care-moh/


Uganda – Why gynaecologists and obstetricians became SRHR advocates

By Dr. Simon Peter Kayondo
July 27, 2023

KAMPALA – Under normal circumstances, gynecologists (doctors who specialize in female reproductive health) should be attending to mothers and prospective mothers with pregnancy or child birth complications in maternity wards; but as fate would have it, members of the Association of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in Uganda (AOGU) have also joined the Sexual, Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) advocacy movement for obvious reasons.

As a member of AOGU, I think this move was long overdue given the not so impressive maternal and child health statistics in our country. For a long time for instance, the teenage pregnancy rate has stagnated at a high of 25% with some regions and districts way above this national average. The situation became worse at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Continued: https://www.pmldaily.com/oped/2023/07/dr-simon-peter-kayondo-why-gynaecologists-and-obstetricians-became-srhr-advocates.html


Dr Simon Peter Kayondo on implementing the Maputo Protocol in Uganda

7 July 2023

Jameen Kaur, Advocating for Safe Abortion Project – FIGO
On 11 July 2023, FIGO is celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Maputo Protocol by sharing reflections from across Africa on how the Maputo Protocol has impacted the practice of obstetrics and gynaecology. Dr Simon Peter Kayondo, an obstetrician-gynaecologist from Uganda, discusses the achievements of the treaty and the remaining challenges to fully implement its provisions in the Ugandan context.

What have been the key achievements of the Maputo Protocol?
As we celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the Maputo protocol I can see, as a gynaecologist, the impact it has had on the women's and girls’ health and rights, especially in Uganda. 

Continued: https://www.figo.org/maputo-protocol-at-20/simon-kayondo


Uganda – Three medics arrested over abortion in Bukedea

Friday, May 12, 2023
By YAHUDU KITUNZI

Police in Bukedea District have arrested a doctor and two nurses for allegedly assisting a 16-year-old pupil to abort her three-month pregnancy.

The suspects attached to Ebenezer Health Center in Bukedea District reportedly carried out the abortion on April 30, 2023, when the victim whose names have been withheld because she is minor went to their clinic. 

Continued: https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/news/national/three-medics-arrested-over-abortion-in-bukedea-4232392


Uganda – Women’s Day: Allow women to choose when to have children and with whom! AWAC wants restrictive abortion laws revised

BY NELSON MANDELA | PML DAILY REPORTER 
March 9, 2023

KAMPALA – Alliance of Women Advocating for Change (AWAC), a Civil Society Organistion that works with female sex workers has challenged the government to loosen up the abortion laws to enable women and girls to access safe abortion services at any point needed.

AWAC had joined the rest of the world to commemorate International Women’s Day. They celebrated the day with less-privileged women and girls of Katanga suburb, one of the slum areas of Kampala.

Continued: https://www.pmldaily.com/news/2023/03/womens-day-allow-women-to-choose-when-to-have-children-and-with-whom-awac-wants-restrictive-abortion-laws-revised.html