Womens-e-news Cheers And Jeers Of The Week

CHEERS:

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and instead of touting the wide array of commercial products that claim to raise funds for breast cancer, many organizations around the country have initiated campaigns to make breast cancer treatment and detection more affordable and to fund new technology and research for breast cancer patients.

Florida Republican Rep. Mark Foley resigned from Congress Friday afternoon in the wake of an alleged scandal involving sexually explicit e-mails to teen male pages, wreaking havoc in a House race less than six weeks before Election Day, according to the Associated Press. The development brightened the prospects for Tim Mahoney, a pro-choice Democrat who was not considered a formidable opponent to Foley, an anti-choice incumbent who won re-election in 2004 with 68 percent of the vote in the Republican-leaning district in central Florida

A federal judge has struck down a 2004 Ohio state law that banned the use of the abortion drug, RU-486, after the seventh week of pregnancy, the Associated Press reported Sept 28. The judge determined the law was too vague and had no exception to protect the health of the woman.

JEERS:

The directors of the Bahraini College have released a new law forcing female students to wear reserved clothing, reported Al Arabiyah Sept. 29. This law, approved by the Bahraini minister of education, prohibits women from wearing short skirts, shorts and any tight clothing.

Women fill less than 10 percent of seats on corporate boards at 300 of the world's top businesses, Agence France-Presse reported Sept. 25. A joint study from three financial firms showed that women held 7.6 percent of seats on executive committees at those businesses, which together have $17.9 billion in revenues.

Up to 200,000 Nepalese women are detained against their will in Indian brothels and 25 percent are under 18, reported the New Kerala newspaper Sept. 24. A report from the Asian Development Bank says that 12,000 Nepalese women are trafficked every year to India on the promise of jobs or because they are a burden to their families.