www.newsandletters.org
|
|
NEWS & LETTERS, December 2002
Women Worldwide
by Mary Jo Grey At least 450 registered nurses went on strike in
mid-November against the Doctors Medical Center in California, when Tenet
Healthcare, Inc. refused to meet their concerns about safe staffing levels and a
livable retirement package. Tenet plans to replace the nurses with scab workers.
The nurses had made major concessions in 1997 to keep the hospital open. Yet
today's annual pension package for the Tenet CEO is $1,896,000, while for an RN
with 29 years service it's $3,000. * * * In the past few months many girls' schools in Afghanistan
have been damaged or destroyed by rocket-propelled grenades and arson.
Accompanying leaflets stated "it is un-Islamic to educate girls" and
warned: "if you send your girls to school, you will be responsible for the
consequences." But the attacks only strengthened the resolve of local
people to defend their daughters' right to an education. * * * In the latest salvo in President Bush's war on women he decided to withhold $34 million already approved by Congress for the UN Fund for Population Activities. These funds provide contraception, family planning, safe births, and work against the spread of HIV and female genital mutilation in the poorest countries of the world--where over 600,000 women (many children themselves) die every year from pregnancy and childbirths. |
|
Home l News & Letters Newspaper l Back issues l News and Letters Committees l Dialogues l Raya Dunayevskaya l Contact us l Search Published by News and Letters Committees |
