Discussions about gender justice in health have been one of the priorities during the discussions at the 5th People’s Health Assembly (PHA), taking place from April 7 to 11 in Mar del Plata, Argentina. Activists participating in the Assembly exchanged experiences from the feminist struggle, including campaigns to increase the accessibility of sexual and reproductive health services, improve working conditions for women in the health sector, and dismantle patriarchal models that lead to the perpetuation of violence against women.
The number of femicides recorded by social movements around Latin America and the world points to the fact that we are facing a true public health crisis, activists present at the Assembly warned. Among them was Marta Montero, mother of Lucía Pérez Montero, a 16-year-old killed by femicide. Montero presented numbers recorded by the families and friends of girls and women – over 6,000 of them – who were killed and disappeared in the same way between 2006 and 2023, and did not see any recourse to true justice.
“91 women have been killed since Lucía died in 2016,” Montero said. And, she added, the government doesn’t care. “Nobody cares about poor, Black women. Coincidentally, it is the poor women who die, who disappear.”
Even inside health systems, which should be places of safety, women are being deprived of essential health procedures. Camila Giugliani, a health activist and physician, illustrated this with the example of Brazil. Obstetric violence permeates women’s health services in this country, particularly in the form of obstetric racism. According to Giugliani, at least 44% of non-white women in Brazil have experienced some form of obstetric racism, in addition to facing significantly higher rates of maternal mortality.
Discrimination and violence against women inside health institutions are widespread in other countries of Latin America too. Pilar Galende from the Argentinian Federation of General Medicine (FAMG) recalled experiences where, after giving birth, women were unable to tell her the name of their children because “the doctor didn’t like the name they chose.”
Even in the case of the right to abortion, where achievements have been seen over the past years thanks to mass mobilizations, access is still far from what is needed. “The criminalization of abortion affects the most vulnerable,” warned Giugliani, talking about the position in which poor, working-class, and Indigenous women find themselves.
Despite the fact that under the Milei government Argentina is facing a regression in the advances achieved in the field of women’s health, local activists remain convinced that resistance will pay off if organized in unity across groups and movements. “We have to keep fighting, not be afraid. We have to come together,” Montero said.
Her call was echoed by the participants of the Assembly, who repeated the call of the women’s movement in Argentina for International Working Women’s Day, chanting, “Latin America will be all-feminist.”
Activists went beyond calls, building strategies on past experiences. A strong emphasis was placed on transgenerational learning among women inside social movements, as well as on the incorporation of values of peace and sisterhood shared in other movements. Gender justice can only be achieved as an intersection of efforts, the PHA 5 agreed. This includes making gender a cross-cutting element of all struggles represented at the Assembly: those for a stronger public health system, peace, and climate justice.
“Feminist solidarity locates us in a framework of mutual support,” said Sonia Gutierrez from the Winaq Political Movement in Guatemala, speaking about the potential of women’s struggles to contribute to Health for All.
“For the liberation of women, of the peoples who have been conquered, we must free ourselves from historical oppressions,” Gutierrez added. The road to achieving such liberation lies in building a joint social movement representing the existing achievements of feminist struggles and built upon the solidarity and unity they already include.
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