Brazil's Government Breaks Down Barriers

While in the U.S. the various legislatures try to use the methods of punitive prescription of cancer treatment to threaten children about sex, (see Diane's post just below this), in Brazil a progressive leader is showing common sense and uncommon benevolence.

President da Silva is putting together a program to give access to birth control to the less affluent, so that women of all economic levels can hold sway over reproduction, and thereby their avenue to economic health.

That the Pope just plowed indifferently through the South American continent declaring that women's bodies belong to the religious authorities, this is more applaudable than usual.

Just weeks after Pope Benedict XVI denounced government-backed contraception in a visit to Brazil, the president unveiled a program Monday to provide cheap birth control pills at 10,000 drug stores across the country.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said the plan will give poor Brazilians "the same right that the wealthy have to plan the number of children they want."

Brazil already hands out free condoms and birth control pills at government-run pharmacies. But many poor people in Latin America's largest country don't go to those pharmacies, so Silva's administration decided to offer the pills at drastically reduced prices at private drug stores, said Health Minister Jose Gomes Temporao.

The price for a year's supply of birth control pills under the new program would be $2.40, and anyone - rich or poor - can buy the pills by simply showing a government-issued identification card that almost all Brazilians carry.
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Faria said the program could reduce the 800,000 illegal abortions that Brazilian women have each year. About 4,000 women die from the back-office procedures annually, making it the fourth leading cause of maternal death in Brazil after hypertension, hemorrhages and infections.

The concern for women's rights is another branch of concern for health and well-being. When a family is not forced to grow beyond its means, those means can be applied to caring for, and educating itself. In a country like Brazil, where income is low, this is particularly acute on the part of the leadership.

In the U.S., the rightwingers who insist that women should be forced to carry children to term once they are conceived, no matter what the circumstances, such good sense and concern would be welcome. For those who think that caring for the health of young women should be subordinated to righteous indignation that they might commit follies if they were protected from fatal disease, it would be a return to the kind of sanity we need so badly.