Newborns in Egypt get blue ribbons in fight against FGM

Swine flu claims 226 in India

BEIRUT, Feb 6, (Agencies): Doctors at two Cairo hospitals will pin blue ribbon badges to the clothing of newborn baby girls on Wednesday as they launch a campaign to persuade parents in Egypt to “say no to female genital mutilation”.

The country has the highest number of women affected by FGM in the world, with nearly nine in 10 having been cut, according to UN data.

Parents will receive the badges – which resemble the Arabic word “no” and look like an upside down version of awareness ribbons for HIV/AIDS and breast cancer – after signing a pledge that they will not have their daughters cut.

Activists hope more hospitals will join the campaign, which launches on International Day of Zero Tolerance for FGM. FGM was banned in Egypt in 2008 and criminalised in 2016, but the practice persists, with most procedures now carried out by health professionals.

Many families see FGM as a religious obligation and a way to preserve their daughter’s virginity.

“It is a wrong and ugly belief. We have to make clear that FGM (does not stop) sexual desire,” said pediatric doctor Amira Edris who works at one of the Cairo hospitals.

“I have a veil on my head and I respect religious rules ... but this is not a religious rule – it is a false belief,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

FGM, which commonly involves the partial or total removal of the external genitalia, is practised in a swathe of African countries and parts of Asia and the Middle East.

It is often done by traditional cutters with unsterilised blades, but there is an increasing trend for FGM to be carried out by health professionals – particularly in Egypt, Guinea, Kenya, Nigeria and Sudan.

Also: NEW DELHI:

India is facing a massive outbreak of swine flu as it claimed 226 lives and the number of affected has crossed 6,000 since the beginning of this year, local reports said.

Government statistics and local reports showed that around 6,601 people have been infected by H1N1 virus while 226 lives were lost since Jan 1, 2019.

TOKYO:

Japan’s swine fever outbreak has spread to five prefectures including Osaka, and more than 10,000 pigs will be culled as part of measures to prevent further contagion, the government said on Wednesday.

This is a different strain from the deadly African swine fever China has been battling, an agriculture ministry official said.

RABAT:

The number of people who died as a result of swine flu (H1N1) in Morocco has risen to 16, the Rabat government announced Tuesday.

Mustafa Khalfi, answering questions of parliament members, said authorities registered 16 deaths while 36 cases were under medical examination.