Witness 9 Audio Testimony

I currently live in Kandahar province, in Kandahar city. While access to health services in the city isn’t as limited as in the districts, access to female doctors is restricted, and in the districts, access is extremely limited.

I graduated from the judiciary and prosecutor’s office, and I completed a legal clinic. However, with the arrival of the Taliban, my dreams were shattered. I couldn’t work in the judicial and legal sectors, even though I was very interested in working in my field. Unfortunately, that path was closed to me. Since women were initially allowed to work in the health sector, I studied midwifery and took a job there. I worked for a while, but the Taliban closed that down too. Despite that sector being vital for all Afghan people, I was removed from that job, and even private projects were shut down.

Just two days ago, they even banned female dentists from treating women in Kandahar province. There are no female dentists from the female population at all in Kandahar province, and other female doctors are very few—maybe just one or two in the entire city of Kandahar. They have completely banned male doctors from treating female patients. Female patients are now even banned from seeing female doctors. These are things that affect us women deeply. I am particularly affected because I lost the job I had in the health sector. I couldn’t advance in the judiciary, nor could I continue working in the health sector, and this has had a major psychological impact on me.

Even though there are private hospitals in the city, the Taliban have imposed so many restrictions on women that a new restriction is enforced every day. In Mirwais Regional Hospital in Kandahar city, the largest hospital at the zone level, there are only a limited number of female specialists, who have come from Kabul for their residency, and they might leave too. Restrictions on women on one hand, and restrictions on female doctors on the other, have created significant problems for us. They have closed schools, institutes, and health universities to girls, yet they don’t allow women to see male doctors. So, where will the female doctors come from? The problem exists not just in Kandahar but even in Kabul because no new female doctors are graduating.

The situation in the districts is dire. The districts are very, very far from the city center. When I traveled to districts like Khakrez for organizations, there was only one basic clinic in the entire district. It was only a basic service center, so the services that should be available in that area were missing. People would go everywhere. If they were treated, fine, but otherwise, patients couldn’t travel to the city. Women were the victims. We saw most female patients lose their lives due to the lack of specialists and facilities, because the city is a four-hour drive away.

In the city, there is only one regional hospital, which also lacks female specialists in every field. In the districts, they don’t have hospitals and clinics, but only health service centers, and they can’t treat patients. People, especially women, are losing their lives due to very simple illnesses. We don’t have doctors, and we don’t have hospitals. If they exist, all the doctors are male. Both women and men in Kandahar province face severe health challenges. Every day, a new restriction is imposed, and a doctor or nurse is dismissed from their job. It’s likely that soon they will gradually dismiss and ban the remaining female doctors from their jobs. Where should women go? How will they get treatment? The Taliban won’t even allow women to visit a male doctor. They absolutely forbid women from seeing a male doctor for obstetrics and gynecology issues. This forces women to give birth at home, like a century ago. They might survive the birth or die during it, leading to a significant increase in maternal mortality.

These are the issues that affect me and the community. Their policy is that women shouldn’t even play a role in the health sector. Facilities are available, and female doctors still exist, but they have been dismissed. Foreign projects are being shut down from within Afghanistan because they demand that the projects be given to local organizations. I myself worked at Save the Children. Our project was five years long, but the Taliban’s Emirate said this project must be given to the Afghan Ministry of Education. The foreigners refused, and that health sector is still inactive. The local classes in the health sector have been eliminated and are still not active.

Facilities are available, but their misogynistic policy is the only impediment. The policy is that women should not work, women should be dismissed, women should stay at home, and there should be no women in the health sector.

I haven’t personally been sick with a condition that couldn’t be treated, but two days ago, a family member had a health issue. I couldn’t find a female obstetrics and gynecology specialist and was forced to see a midwife. Here, they only have midwives; there are no obstetrics and gynecology specialists. I went to a hospital called Ayubi Hospital; it had a midwife, not a specialist. Here, women who have studied advanced midwifery are called specialists. There are no doctors who have studied medicine for seven years and then specialized. Mirwais Regional Hospital has only two or three female doctors who have come to complete their specialization, but they are extremely busy, and there are an excessive number of patients. The doctors are only fulfilling their target process. Most people don’t go there because it’s too busy; only those with severe problems, weak finances, and those from the districts visit, since there are only two doctors and too many patients.

Just recently, I wanted to take a sick family member to a specialist, but there were no specialists, so I was forced to take them to a midwife. There is no female specialist or doctor in Kandahar who can perform a C-section; all of them are male.

It has been two days since they even banned women from going to the dentist. How can a woman go to a male doctor for a C-section examination?. They also banned women from going to a male tailor.

When I was in Khakrez district for three months, women there faced severe health issues. Their children were all malnourished and needed vaccines, but there were no vaccines. Most patients had kidney stones because they lacked access to clean drinking water. I saw with my own eyes the extent of the health problems, including obstetric complications. Most women were malnourished and needed C-sections during childbirth, but they lacked access and used local methods. Even the families there are very restrictive and do not allow women to travel to the city, nor do they take them.

One patient came in, and her condition was very poor. The woman told me to tell the clinic doctor to ask her husband to take her to the city. I asked her why she wouldn’t tell him herself, and she said her husband told her, ‘The money I spend on you, I can use to marry another woman’. This was very striking to me. You may not believe it, but this is a very common issue there. Even in the last years of the republic, when I worked in Panjwaii, there were problems, but not to the extent they are now