Mozambique: Women protest in Maputo hospital against obstetric violence

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique: Women protest in Maputo hospital against obstetric violence

11:17 CAT | 04 Mar 2025

FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: News24]

A group of just over a dozen women demonstrated this Monday in front of Matola Provincial Hospital in Maputo, southern Mozambique, against alleged “mistreatment” and “medical negligence” during childbirth procedures there.

“We are outraged by the mistreatment, the theft of our babies and the removal of our wombs without our consent,” Lodovina Michel, an activist from the Resilient Women’s Organization told Lusa.

Dressed in traditional capulanas and black clothes, with whistles and dolls in their arms, the women sang songs and held up posters with messages criticizing the Matola Provincial Hospital for alleged obstetric violence, with at least one case involving the unit already under trial in the Maputo court.

The women are calling for an end to violence, in a message to midwives and doctors at the provincial hospital, after several cases were reported on social media, the most famous being the “Leila case”, a woman who had her uterus removed after a Caesarean section, in which the baby was declared dead, but the body was never returned to the family.

The trial in the Leila case began on February 19, wrote Quitéria Guirengane, a social activist who is following the case, on her Facebook page, calling for “justice”.

“The trial will not be about the Leila case, but once again about the possibility of citizens trusting the Public Prosecutor’s Office, as the guardian of legality, and the courts, as the house of justice. It is dangerous for justice to fail Leila. Justice for Leila is a step towards justice for all of us,” Guirengane wrote.

Ludovina Michel also reported the case of a woman who “fell ill” after doctors left cotton wool inside her body during the operation for childbirth, a situation that prevented her from joining the other women to protest today.

“I have a sister-in-law who couldn’t come here because she’s not in a good condition. She had an operation and they left cotton wool there and she felt very ill because of it (…). We are here to demand that the midwives and doctors treat us well, because we are the ones who generate the doctors, the nurses and everyone who works there,” Michel told Lusa.

Another protester complained that they were prevented from entering the hospital to “speak to the midwives”, saying that they were only at the institution to “demand their rights”. “Today they are removing our uteruses. Why are they removing our uteruses without our consent? It can’t be, we are tired, enough is enough,” she said.

The demonstration at the entrance to the Matola Provincial Hospital was also marked by the presence of a police contingent. “We took off our blouses and left our breasts exposed and said that we would not back down,” added Ludovina Michel, noting that the women later managed to meet with the management of the Matola Provincial Hospital, who promised to investigate the cases.

“We warned that we would return and in greater numbers if we had any more cases of obstetric violence at that hospital,” concluded the leader of the Resilient Women’s Organization.

According to the 2017 population census, the maternal death rate is 452 per 100,000 live births, which continues to place Mozambique among the countries where women have the highest risk of death during pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period.

Source: Lusa