In the latest crackdown by the Taliban on women’s rights, Afghanistan issued a decree barring women from training to become nurses and midwives, a move that sparked condemnation across the world and has been described as “an outrageous act of ignorance” by human rights organizations and activists.
Taliban move to ban women from training in nursing and midwifery, in another crackdown on women’s rights.
It comes after the group banned women from speaking in public, banned girls from high school education and banned women from traveling without a male guardian.
Source: AP pic.twitter.com/m0BKspmERz— Oli London (@OliLondonTV) December 7, 2024
Although details about the ban have yet to be shared publicly, several media reports and sources confirmed the order was announced at a meeting of the Taliban's Ministry of Public Health on December 2nd and communicated to training institutes soon after.
Sources close to the Ministry of Public Health also confirmed that they received orders to shut down medical institutions for female students until further notice. Nursing and midwifery students, medical trainees, and institutions across the Afghan capital, Kabul, and other provinces confirmed that their classes have been suspended and that the ban is in place.
A group of female students in the western province of Herat gathered at the provincial governor’s office to protest the ban and the closure of health institutes on December 5th, chanting slogans such as “We will not give up our rights” and “Education is our right.”
"Emotional footage from Afghanistan shows Afghan female medical students and their instructor in tears, consoling each other after the Taliban banned them from continuing their studies. The new directive shuts women out of medicine including nursing — the last field still open to… pic.twitter.com/S2vvag1fLs
— Imtiaz Mahmood (@ImtiazMadmood) December 4, 2024
“A society without female doctors or medical workers is doomed,” a female medical student and activist from Kabul said.
International human rights organizations, activists, and agencies joined Afghan women in criticizing the ban and raising concerns about women’s rights and access to education and the ban’s impact on women’s access to healthcare.
Heather Barr, the interim deputy director of women’s rights at Human Rights Watch, warned the new measures being implemented by the Taliban follow a broader pattern where they take “more and more from women” and further restrict their lives and rights.
“If you ban women from being treated by male healthcare professionals, and then you ban women from training to become healthcare professionals, the consequences are clear: women will not have access to healthcare and will die as a result,” Barr said.
Afghan girls and women are sex slaves not nurses
— M Jack77 (@m_jack77) December 4, 2024
Mariam Aman, assistant editor for the BBC’s Afghan language service, said the implications of this new order can be enormous, arguing that it “is impacting around 17,000 female student trainees.”
“You can imagine five years down the line, women will be giving birth at home alone, and there will be districts with no midwives and no access to health,” she added.
Samira Hamidi, an Afghan activist, and human rights campaigner for Amnesty International, described the ban as “an outrageous act of ignorance by the Taliban, who continue to lead a war against women and girls in Afghanistan,” warning that “this draconian action will have a devastating long-term impact on the lives of millions of Afghans, especially women, and girls.”
Do they realize that this isn going to essentially cause their own extinction? Because the mortality rate for women birthing in unfavorable conditions is going to increase, and their birth rates are going to decrease, so essentially, they're forcing their own extinction.
— Untamed Phoenix (@theuntamed54) December 3, 2024
“In a country like Afghanistan, where people are bound to traditional and cultural practices, women in most parts of the country are not allowed to be checked or treated by a male doctor. With this ban, it will mean there will be no more midwives, nurses, female lab and medical personnel to serve female patients,” Hamidi said.
Even before the Taliban took over Afghanistan following a pull-out of US-led NATO troops in the country in 2021, maternal healthcare in Afghanistan had been precarious, and the country ranked among the lowest for maternal safety, with 620 women dying for every 100,000 live births in 2020.
Data from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) states that Afghanistan needs an additional 18,000 skilled midwives for Afghan women to get adequate healthcare.
