Posted on Monday 11 May 2009 - 15:50
Murtala Mohamed Kamara, AfricaNews reporter in Freetown, Sierra Leone

Females with mutilated clitoris can now breathe a sigh of relief following the construction of a hospital in Burkina Faso that would specialize in the reconstruction of the sex organ. The US non-profit organization Clitoraid is funding the $50,000 project which is dubbed "Pleasure Hospital."



The ‘Pleasure Hospital’ situated at Bobo- Dioulasso in the western part of Burkina Faso will help women especially victims of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) wishing to have their clitoris restored after going through such ordeal.

‘Pleasure Hospital’ will offer free clitoral reconstruction surgeries to victims of FGM all throughout the West Africa region, according to the humanitarian news agency IRIN.

Mariam Banemanie, President of Clitoraid's local NGO partner, Voices of Women said "Clitoraid decided to build the clinic in Bobo-Dioulasso because it is at the crossroads of several West African countries." "The clinic will restore justice and give women the ability to feel sexual pleasure." Banemanie said whiles questioned "Burkinabé women are beginning to stand up for what they believe in - why should sexual pleasure not be a part of that?"

Some female journalists were striped naked in Sierra Leone early this year for mere reporting on FGM. The World Health Organization (WHO) which defines FGM as ‘any injury to female genital organs for non-medical reasons’ said over three million girls are at risk of it.

Abi Sanon, 36, who went through the reconstruction of the organ at a private clinic in Ouagadougou in 2006 after it was cut at a tender age said "I wanted to find my integrity and to know real pleasure. The procedure cost $320; my boyfriend contributed. It has really changed our lives. Before, I did not really know what pleasure felt like, and now it is not my boyfriend who calls the shots in our relationship - it is much more equal," she said.

Sanon told IRIN she was surprised at her family’s positive reaction when she informed them she had wanted the surgery, since she said talking about sexual pleasure is still seen as taboo in her country.

Her 70-year-old mother has expressed interest in having the procedure once the hospital opens.

http://www.thenational.ae/article/20090511/FOREIGN/705109870/1017/NEWS

Kate Thomas, Foreign Correspondent

Abibata Sanon, above, is one of the first women in
West Africa to undergo the genital reconstruction
procedure at a private clinic. Olivier Asselin for The National

BOBO-DIALOUSSO, BURKINA FASO // Africa’s first clinic designated for the reconstruction of female genitalia will open in Bobo-Dialousso this year. The clinic will offer free reconstructive surgery to women from across West Africa.

About 70 per cent of Burkina Faso’s seven million women are victims of female genital mutilation (FGM), a deep-rooted practice in West Africa. The ritual, common in a stretch between Senegal and Benin, can cause complications such as serious infections, excessive bleeding and stillbirths.

Mariam Banemanie, the director of Voices of Women, a Burkinabé non-governmental organisation that is paying for the clinic with Clitoraid, an NGO based in Las Vegas, said about 90 per cent of Burkinabé women in their 20s feel no sexual sensation. “Currently reconstruction is only available in the capital for a fee upwards of 160,000 CFA [Dh1,200]. That option isn’t available to every woman, which is why we’re excited about the construction of the clinic in Bobo-Dialousso,” Ms Banemanie said. “Burkina Faso is fast becoming the crossroads for genital reconstruction surgery in Africa.”

Thousands of African women between the ages of 18 and 70 have expressed interest in undergoing the surgery in Burkina Faso, according to Marissé Caissy of Clitoraid. Some plan to travel to Bobo-Dialousso from such neighbouring countries as Ivory Coast and Mali for the operation. Ms Caissy said sexual sensation is restored in about 90 per cent of cases. Recovery takes at least six weeks.

When the clinic opens in October, Abi Ouardé, 24, will be one of the first women through its doors.

Ms Ouardé carries herself like a woman in a hurry. She drives a shiny new Yamaha moped, slings a leather bag over her shoulder, wears a sleek black dress and bejewelled heels that match the royal blue of the mudguards. As she skids to a halt and shimmies off the moped, heads turn. She looks every inch the liberated West African woman.

But something is missing from Ms Ouardé’s life and she is eager to restore it. At the age of four she became a victim of genital mutilation. “Because sexuality is taboo in Burkina Faso, circumcised women are not supposed to talk about the fact that they don’t feel any sensation. It’s seen as something we just have to put up with,” she said.

Three years ago, Abibata Sanon, 36, became one of the first women in West Africa to undergo the procedure at a private clinic in Ouagadougou. She has since become a symbol of the fight against FGM. “Having the surgery seemed like the perfect opportunity to take a stand against FGM,” she said. Ms Sanon’s longtime boyfriend was eager for her to have the surgery and even helped pay for it. But women say the fact that many men still favour the practice is the biggest hurdle in the battle for gender equality in West Africa.

“Some men believe that a woman will never stray if her ability to feel pleasure is removed. It’s time for our voices to be heard. People are beginning to understand the concept of women’s liberation. Women deserve to feel good about themselves,” Ms Banemanie said.

Although FGM is banned in several West African countries, including Ghana and Burkina Faso, it remains widespread. The practice was deemed illegal in Burkina Faso in 1996, but rights groups say perpetrators have switched tactics to avoid detection, targeting toddlers and babies whose cries do not raise suspicion.

Ms Banemanie said once the restoration clinic opens, its presence might even serve as a deterrent. “If cut women are able to restore themselves, perhaps people will realise that it’s no longer worthwhile to continue with the cutting,” she said.

Since having the surgery, the effect on Ms Sanon’s life has been remarkable. A few months after undergoing the procedure, she told her mother, who backed her father when he took her to be cut as a baby, about the operation. “The reaction of my 70-year-old mother shocked me. She was very supportive and even now she keeps asking me when the clinic will open. I wonder if she wants to have the surgery herself.”

And then there is the effect on her personal life. “Until I had the operation, it was my boyfriend that called the shots. Now our relationship is more equal.”

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http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=84256

BOBO-DIOULASSO, 6 May 2009 (IRIN) - Construction has begun of West Africa’s first clinic for reconstructing clitorises for victims of female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C). Amid high demand, the US non-profit Clitoraid is funding the clinic, dubbed “Pleasure Hospital”, in Bobo-Dioulasso, western Burkina Faso.

Financed through the non-profit’s “Adopt a clitoris” campaign that sponsors women wishing to have clitoral reconstruction, Clitoraid raised more than US$50,000 to build the facility. Construction began in March and is expected to be completed by September.

Once opened, US-based gynaecological surgeons will offer free clitoral reconstruction surgeries to FGM/C victims from across West Africa. Currently too few surgeons are available to serve the number of women who want to reconstruct their mutilated clitorises and the price in private clinics remains unaffordable for most, according to the few surgeons trained on the procedure in Burkina Faso where the surgery was pioneered in 2006.

“Clitoraid decided to build the clinic in Bobo-Dioulasso because it is at the crossroads of several West African countries,” said Mariam Banemanie, president of Clitoraid’s local NGO partner, Voices of Women.

Cross-border FGM/C has been on the rise in West Africa in recent years, with cutters and girls evading one country’s laws by participating in FGM/C in a neighbouring country.

“The clinic will restore justice and give women the ability to feel sexual pleasure,” Banemanie told IRIN. “Burkinabé women are b eginning to stand up for what they believe in – why should sexual pleasure not be a part of that?”

There has been such high demand for the reconstruction surgery that Clitoraid has placed a cap on the waiting list at 100, she said. Voices of Women receives daily calls from women – and sometimes husbands – expressing interest in the procedure, she added.

Prospective patients receive counselling from the NGO’s psychologist who – on request – puts them in touch with women who have had clitoral reconstruction surgery in private clinics.

Abi Sanon, 36, said she was “lucky” to undergo clitoral reconstruction at a hospital in Ouagadougou in 2006. “I wanted to find my integrity and to know real pleasure. The procedure cost $320; my boyfriend contributed. It has really changed our lives. Before, I did not really know what pleasure felt like, and now it is not my boyfriend who calls the shots in our relationship – it is much more equal,” said Sanon, who told IRIN she had her clitoris cut as a young girl.

Sanon told IRIN she was surprised at her family’s positive reaction when she informed them she had wanted the surgery, since she said talking about sexual pleasure is still seen as taboo in her country.

Her 70-year-old mother has expressed interest in having the procedure once the hospital opens.

By Nancy Ellis
For The Times Independent
Dr. Marci Bowers relaxes along a Parisian waterway during her trip to learn a reconstructive surgical procedure. Special to TI
Recently returned from a trip to Paris, Dr. Marci Bowers couldn't help but comment on a few of that famous city's many amenities. But her real purpose for traveling such a great distance from Trinidad was actually quite serious: A second training with the French surgeon who has pioneered reconstructive surgery of the clitoris after ritual excision.

Often referred to as female genital mutilation (FGM), or female circumcision, the practice is common worldwide, especially in many East African and some Islamic cultures. There are more than 120 million women worldwide who have undergone the procedure, according to Clitoraid, an international nonprofit organization that recruited Bowers for the training. Often performed by family members without anesthesia and using a knife, the edge of a can or even a piece of broken glass, FGM has many cultural and religious ramifications, but its primary intention is to curb the female sex drive.

Bowers traveled to Paris to train with a French surgeon the first time in April of 2007, when she observed eight separate surgeries. This time, she saw 11 surgeries at the Louis XIV Hospital in Saint-Germain en Laye, about 15 miles west of Paris. Bowers was especially interested in learning details of the pre-op and post-op care.

"It (the training) has been extremely enlightening to me," says Bowers of her time spent with the Hungarian-born urologist, whom she refers to as a "great humanitarian." The reconstructive surgery "is well within the scope of what I already do. It is actually one of the simpler procedures."

The subject of FGM is a complex one, Bowers cautions, "and it's easy to judge. We, as a society, need to be more humble," especially coming from a country that routinely circumcises male babies. "But, it's easy to get emotional about it (FGM) when you hear some of those stories.

"The strange part is that female circumcision doesn't really do what is intended very well," according to Bowers, because female erectile tissue is not just confined to the clitoris. "It actually goes all the way back to the uterus," she says. "The areas of arousal are much the same as they are for men; female tissues are remarkably similar in purpose."

The restorative surgery is undertaken to enable a sense of pleasure for these women, who are often are extensively scarred and have never experienced anything but pain during sexual intercourse. Between 3,000 and 4,000 reversals have been performed worldwide, according to Clitoraid, with approximately 2,500 of them by Foldes.

A press release issued by Clitoraid, which is based in Las Vegas, announced that its first U.S. clitoral reconstructive surgeries will be performed in Trinidad by Bowers March 27, "who has volunteered her services." Bowers says she has been contacted by six women in the last month who desire the surgery, three are Africans who have been living in the United states, and the other three are from Canada.

"My main focus, in more than 20 years in OB-GYVN, has always been on women's health care issues," says Bowers. The hardest part of adding yet another subspecialty to her repertoire of medical services will be finding the time.

But anyone who knows Bowers knows she'll find it somehow: "I'm just doing this because it needs to be done."

http://www.trinidad-times.com/main.asp?SectionID=14&SubSectionID=151&ArticleID=2014