The Taliban Are Harming Afghan Women’s Health

March 2, 2022

(Foreign Policy) – On a note tacked to the wall of a health clinic in December 2021, in the now Taliban-controlled district of Kahmard, there was a new directive: “From now on,” it read, “no women can come to health centers without a mahram.” A mahram is a male chaperone. Restrictions like these are showing up all over the country. In the southern province of Ghazni, a 42-year-old midwife said the Taliban have been preventing doctors from examining women without a mahram present since November 2021. (We are not identifying Afghans who spoke to us by name to protect their safety.) (Read More)