Introduction
According to the transcript, although there are law enforcement agencies, the environment in, which South Sudanese refugees are in have no clear laws. The law enforcement officers particularly the migration officers try to enforce laws, which do not exist this made me think that the refugees from South Sudan are at the mercy of the police officers in the law enforcement agencies. This is given the fact that the police officers from the law enforcement agencies could go along, making up the laws as they interacted with the refugees. The transcript highlights that the law enforcers were extremely underpaid or not paid at all by the existing government. For this reason, I believe that the police would find ways to make money from the refugees who would sometimes have money wired to them from their relatives abroad, which would turn out to be oppressive to the refugees. More, I think that the law enforcement officers oppressed the refugees since they restricted the refugees in their respective camps and forbade the refugees from living in big towns.
Relation to the History of Global Health and Technologies Course Themes
According to the transcript, the oppression from the police officers is not the only issue refugees had to deal with. In particular, the women in the refugee camps not only suffered from patriarchy but denial of their reproductive rights in the context of cultural practices. A perfect example given in the transcript is when the men joined their families and wives in the camps with the idea of making them pregnant and then go away. As a result, the women in the refugee camps bore the burden of terminating the pregnancies using back-alley methods which were a threat to their reproductive health. This, in turn, relates to the course themes of the history of global health and technologies as it reflects the reproductive health battles that the women in the refugee camps have to put on, as the decision to terminate their pregnancies in such unsafe methods are due to poverty and lack of basic reproductive health care systems.
In addition, the relationship between the themes of the history of global health and technologies are highlighted by the fact that the women in refugee camps lack reproductive health care systems due to poverty and the stigma of abortion. The transcript highlights that poverty and stigma are barriers to women seeking and getting reproductive healthcare services. The inability to access good health care services, in particular their reproductive health needs, cripples the ability of the women in the refugee camps to manage and take care of their bodies. The stigma of pregnancy termination be it safe or unsafe makes the women feel that the decisions they make when it comes to their own bodies are questioned. The global health and technologies course themes are highlighted in the transcript given the fact that women in the refugee camps want to take charge of their own reproductive health by making simple decisions pertaining pregnancies; that is when and whether they want to get children.
Similarities Between the Presentation and the Article
The presentation and the article have similar themes as they advocate for better reproductive health services for women. This is evident in their support of the use of contraceptives in the transcript and the use of the (IUD) intrauterine device birth control as a contraceptive. Both the presentation and the article present the idea that contraception is a way for women to sustain their reproductive health. This is done through the availing of a choice of options to women even if the contraceptives and reproductive healthcare services are not accessible. Melinda Gates' idea as highlighted in the presentation is that women need to know, what they need even when its problematic, women need to know that what they need is not what they don't know but what they need to go about their lives and decide for themselves is also reflected in the article’s discussion. The article echoes this as it generally supports the idea of choice with contraceptives as a way of women managing their lives and reproductive health.
