Note: The Lawrence Times runs opinion columns and letters to the Times written by community members with varying perspectives on local issues. These pieces do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Times staff.
Would you like to send a letter to the Times? Great! Here’s how to do it.
With the recent decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and the upcoming vote that will affect abortion laws in Kansas, women’s rights have been a hot topic. Women deserve to be uplifted during these trying times, but women in America are far from the only ones who are struggling.
Though I believe we need to continue the conversation about the mistreatment of women’s health care over here, I feel we also need to talk about the way of life that many women have abroad.
Around 800 women die a day from preventable causes related to pregnancy and childbirth. This number has been dropping over the past two decades, but COVID-19 has stopped that progress and worsened this issue.
In Africa, a woman is 47 times more likely to die in childbirth than in the U.S. This is attributed to the lack of health services these communities have.
So what can we do? We are dealing with our own infringement on women’s rights, and it seems out of reach to help women in other countries.
I can tell you it is not. I am an intern working with the Borgen Project, which is a nonprofit that brings attention to international issues such as starvation and health inequality. There are many easy ways for anyone to support these causes and I urge you to do so.
For this particular issue, you can support the Reach Every Mother and Child Act. This proposition calls for a portion of the United States’ International Affairs budget to be put aside specifically for women’s health care. This money will be used to send professionals over who can provide health care to women who need it. The Reach Every Mother and Child Act aims to end preventable deaths in childbirth by 2030.
Supporting this cause is easier than you would think. All you need to do is email Congress through this form. It takes less than a minute, and every voice counts.
— Libby Hale (she/her), Borgen Project Ambassador, Lawrence
Don’t miss a beat … Click here to sign up for our email newsletters
Click here to learn more about our newsletters first
Cast your ballot in the Aug. 2 election
You can quickly request an advance ballot to be mailed to you at KSVotes.org. The last day to request a mail ballot is July 26.
To see what’s on the ballot, visit this link. For information about voting early in person, visit this link. Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Election Day, Tuesday, Aug. 2.
* We are not election workers *
More Community Voices:
Letter to the Times: City should create oversight committee to guide pool renovation project, rebuild trust
”Our petition’s 1,764 signatures, our supporters’ 75 letters, and our research into the extensive flaws in the (pool renovation) community engagement process all indicate that the previously proposed plan did not reflect public opinion,” Holly Krebs writes in this letter to the Times.
Shawn Alexander: Say his name – Fred Harvey Smith (Column)
”Racial violence has been omnipresent in American history, and in far too many of the incidents, the perpetrators of the crime are acquitted or not even brought up on charges. When I think of such cases I am often haunted by the heinous murder of Fred Harvey Smith here in the land of John Brown in May 1936,” Shawn Alexander writes in this column.
