Saudi cleric warns women drivers about ovary damage

RIYADH— One of Saudi Arabia’s top conservative clerics has said women who drive risk damaging their ovaries and bearing children with clinical problems. Sheikh Saleh al-Lohaidan was countering activists who are trying to end the Islamic kingdom’s maleonly driving rules. A campaign calling for women to defy the ban in a protest drive on Oct. 26 has spread rapidly online over the past week. “If a woman drives a car, not out of pure necessity, that could have negative physiological impacts as functional and physiological medical studies show that it automatically affects the ovaries and pushes the pelvis upwards,” Lohaidan told the website sabq.org in an interview.

However, in comments on the privately owned Rotana channel, Saudi gynecologist Mohammed Baknah says studies have not proven that driving has adverse effects on women’s reproductive health.