Kaiser Updates

The South Florida Sun-Sentinel on Monday examined the barriers physicians face in preventing and treating cervical cancer among Latina women, who are disproportionately affected by the disease. According to the National Cancer Institute, Latina women, one-third of whom are uninsured, have the highest incidence of cervical cancer among any ethnic group. "Poor access to health care, cultural taboos about sex" and "unsettling qualms about Pap tests" are some of the obstacles advocates face in trying to fight cervical cancer among Latinas, the Sun-Sentinel reports. Efforts to educate Latinas about cervical cancer include a campaign launched in May by the Gynecologic Cancer Foundation and the National Alliance for Hispanic Health and Spanish-language outreach programs to educate women about Merck's human papillomavirus vaccine Gardasil.

A Portuguese court of appeals in Coimbra, Portugal, on Tuesday sentenced an alleged abortion provider, his assistant and three women accused of having illegal abortions to prison, overruling a 2004 lower court ruling that acquitted them of the charges, AFP/Today Online reports. Abortion is illegal in Portugal except when necessary to protect the life or health of a woman or if a woman becomes pregnant as a result of rape. In the trial, which began in December 2003, public prosecutors also had charged a physician with performing illegal abortions and had charged his two employees and seven other individuals as accomplices, including those who allegedly accompanied the women to the clinic, such as a parent, husband or boyfriend. A lower court in February 2004 dropped the charges against the alleged abortion provider, seven women who were accused of undergoing the illegal procedure and several others accused of being involved with illegal abortions. Presiding Judge Paulo Brandao said that although public prosecutors had proven that the doctor performed abortions at his clinic, they had not proven that the seven women charged had obtained abortions. Brandao said that despite being acquitted, the physician would be penalized by having his car, medical instruments and some money obtained through providing abortions seized by the state.

• In overruling the lower court, the appeals court sentenced the physician to three years and eight months in prison, AFP/Today Online reports. The court also sentenced the woman who worked in the clinic and allegedly assisted the physician in performing abortions to 16 months in prison, suspended for three years, and sentenced the three women who were accused of undergoing the procedure to six months in jail, suspended for two years, according to AFP/Today Online. The appeals court based its decision in part on gynecological exams, which the lower court had not allowed to be submitted as evidence. Defense lawyers have 15 days to appeal the court's decision. Officials say that about 10,000 women annually in Portugal are treated at hospitals for complications caused by illegal abortions.

Gynecological exams, eh? Sounds alot like El Slavadore's notorious Forensic Vagina Specialist.