Population – Page 8 – Population Matters-USA

Dr. Charles Ochieng at the International Conference on Family Planning

Sixteen years ago the Durango Herald published my column “Do your Partner’s Vasectomy”; it got lots of laughs on April Fool’s Day! Unfortunately, the latest news on male sterilization is not so funny.

There is some recent good news, fortunately. In some states, men are rushing to get permanently sterilized because of the recent Supreme Court decision about abortion. My experience, however, is that they will be moving a little more slowly after this minor procedure. I was sore for a couple days after my vasectomy, many years ago.

Remember that vasectomy is much safer and easier than a tubal ligation, the female sterilization procedure. Male sterilization is done with local anesthesia and is finished in just 10 or 15 minutes. There are only two drawbacks to vasectomy. While female sterilization is effective immediately, it takes a couple of months after the procedure before a man starts shooting blanks. The other drawback is that many men are frightened to have it done.

It is interesting to note the countries where vasectomy is most popular. The top five are: South Korea, Australia, Bhutan, the USA and New Zealand. Bhutan? Yes! Perhaps it is because that little country’s government has promoted this simple surgery. Bhutan has had mobile vasectomy camps which bring the service to villagers. Furthermore, men tend to take responsibility for family planning in this enlightened country.

The bad news is that we seem to have reached “peak vasectomy”. Worldwide, the maximum number of couples who use vasectomy for protection from unintended pregnancy was reached in 2001. That year, 44 million couples worldwide were safeguarded by this simple procedure. The latest figures show a sad decline to just 17 million couples who are dependent on vasectomy.

What can be done to bring back vasectomy? One group is doing its best to spread the good word all over the world. World Vasectomy Day, www.wvd.org, has worked in several countries to introduce people—especially men—to this simple surgery. They claim: “World Vasectomy Day is the largest male focused family planning movement ever”. WVD was started by a New York film producer, Jonathan Stack, and urologist Doug Stein. Together, they have built an amazing crusade to not only to do the surgery, but also to train doctors to perform the procedure.

Stein is a master of the No Scalpel Vasectomy technique. It uses a couple of special instruments that make it possible to perform this delicate procedure with tiny incisions. Because it involves less cutting, NSV has fewer complications than older methods.

Vasectomy would be ideal for couples in developing countries who want to stop childbearing, since it doesn’t require a fancy facility. Dr. Charles Ochieng of Nairobi, Kenya has become an evangelist for vasectomy. He had his own vasectomy years ago, and has done hundreds since then. An award-winning family practice doctor, he is devoted to providing vasectomies and teaching other physicians the NSV technique. He learned the NSV technique while spending time in Florida with Dr. Stein.

I met Ochieng at an international family planning convention in Kigali, Rwanda. He told me that he even offered to do his father’s vasectomy! His dad has 3 wives (polygamy is legal in Kenya) and many children. He was sad that his father turned down the gift. For some cultures, a large family is a status symbol, especially for men.

Now, as restrictions on women’s reproductive health increase in the USA, I hope more men will take this small, but important, step to prevent unintended pregnancies.

Listen to the Complexities of Abortion

Screenshot from Kim Wallach singing “Freedom to Choose”

Even though I’ve written many essays about aspects of population, a friend mentioned that I’ve never included songs on the subject. Fortunately, she also pointed me in the right direction. “Freedom to Choose” was written by Bob Blue and Kim Wallach. Kim inspired Bob to write the lyrics after she told him the story of a protester at an abortion clinic. The protestor took her daughter to the same clinic ,when she didn’t want the daughter to have a baby. Unfortunately, Bob is singing in heaven.

Since it is difficult to get much of a tune from this blog, please listen to Kim sing this song at: https://youtu.be/lqPjPOPdgQE

Freedom to Choose

In a clinic on Main Street in Washingtonville

Lost in thought by a window stood Mary McGill

When her eyes met the eyes of a woman outside

Was it rain on her glasses or tears she had cried?

Outside on the picket line Rosemary Flynn

Felt the rain on her face and the anger within

As she stared at that face inside, gentle and warm

That seemed almost to beckon her in from the storm.

And the two women found themselves staring awhile

Recognition, awareness, but never a smile

And there seemed to be some kind of truce in that stare

Until Rosemary Flynn recalled why she was there

Then she held up her sign that said, ”Thou shalt not kill”

And she pointed directly at Mary McGill

And Mary McGill, before starting to turn

Gave a nod to acknowledge Rosemary’s concern

That day Mary counseled a child named Michelle

Who tried hard to seem calm in her personal hell

Mary spoke to Michelle with the tone of a friend

And her gentleness brought Michelle’s calm to an end

Michelle told her story with pain hard to hide

Of her mother and John and the new life inside

She had meant to show love, she had meant no one harm

But her mother felt anger, and John felt alarm

But the new life inside was a life, it was real

With a brain and a heartbeat she wanted to feel

And she wanted that child, she would love it so well

She would build it a heaven to make up for this hell

But she’d end the new life for her mother and John

“I’ll do it,” Michelle said, “for my mother and John.”

These words had an emptiness Mary saw through

“If you do it,” said Mary, “Please do it for you.”

Michelle looked at Mary through the pain and the tears

And Mary saw all of Michelle’s sixteen years

And she thought she saw something of several years more

Or perhaps she had seen Michelle’s face once before

Michelle only murmured the word, “I don’t know”

And she stood, and she turned and she started to go

When Mary made one last request of Michelle

With her parting words, “Take time to think this out well”

That night Michelle’s mother stormed into the place

Not hiding her anger, yet hiding her face

“My daughter came here with a purpose” she said

“Not to have you put foolish ideas in her head

“She’s too young, she’s a girl and the father’s a boy

“And she thinks that a baby is some kind of toy

“Your job was to teacher her, to straighten her out

“Not confuse her, and send her home riddled with doubt”

“My job,” explained Mary, “was not to confuse

“But to make her aware of her freedom to choose

“My job is to make sure the options are known

“You are right she is young, but her life is her own”

Then Mary saw something in this woman’s face

And remembered the person, the time and the place

This woman had labeled abortion a sin

The face in the picket line, Rosemary Flynn.

People often accuse and are quick to condemn

When the issue is safe, and does not affect them

I don’t envy the job facing Mary McGill

I don’t know all the meanings of “thou shalt not kill”

It’s a conflict more simply prevented than solved

But the choice must belong to the woman involved

And I think that the answers come, not from above,

But from us, and our consciences, tempered with love.