1. Sterilization within minority groups Focus groups: Roma communityRoma community Mentally impairedMentally impaired

2. Definitions Sterilization (n) Sterilization is a permanent form of birth control that is extremely effective at preventing pregnancy. Sterilize (v) to perform a medical operation on someone to render them unable to have children. Voluntary (adj) Something done to a person willingly, not because you are forced Involuntary (adj) Something done to a person without their permission Minority groups (n) A small group within a community or country that is different because of race, religion, language etc… Tubal sterilization is an operation which blocks the tubes carrying a woman's egg to her uterus. Vasectomy or Male sterilization procedure that involves removing a section from each vas deferens

3. Genera l Overview Although the use of medical sterilization was not known before the 19 th century, it is well documented that many native minority groups were disadvantaged and were considered unfit for the general community and that there was a general acceptance of the “killing off” of these minorities. There is mention in Swedish history back in the 15 th century that it was lawful to kill certain people. (Gypsies) This may be called the first steps in “Sterilization” as it was designed to limit the numbers of certain minority groups. On May 26th, 1933 The Law to Legalize Eugenic Sterilization came into force in Germany which caused the “sterilization” of thousands of Gypsies and Jews. During the early 1930s in the USA, there was a dramatic increase in the number of sterilizations performed on mildly retarded young women.

4. Part of the story in the USA A review of the archives of prominent eugenicists, the records of eugenic organizations, important legal cases, and state reports indicates that public support for the involuntary sterilization of insane and retarded persons was broad and sustained. During the early 1930s there was a dramatic increase in the number of sterilizations performed upon mildly retarded young women. This change in policy was a product of the Depression. Institutional officials were concerned that such women might bear children for whom they could not provide adequate parental care, and thus would put more demands on strained social services. There is little evidence to suggest that the excesses of the Nazi sterilization program (initiated in 1934) altered American programs. Data are presented here to show that a number of state-supported eugenic sterilization programs were quite active long after scientists had refuted the eugenic thesis.

5. Part of the story in Canada The Sterilization of Leilani Muir Around her 11th birthday she had been admitted to the Provincial Training School for Mental Defectives in Alberta and was given a single IQ test. This was enough, apparently, to determine that she would qualify for sterilization When Leilani Muir was in her twenties a doctor told she would never be able to have children. She was unware that in 1959, at the age of fourteen, she had been sexually sterilized under the Alberta government's Sterilization Act. Leilani says, "[the doctor] said my insides looked like I'd been through a slaughterhouse. Those were his exact words." A National Film Board film in 1996 March 21, 1928 Sexual Sterilization Act becomes law in Alberta. 5 years later Germany does the same, sterilization becoming a tool of the Nazis. October 25, 1929 The Eugenics Board is established, and orders for sterilizations are commenced. October, 1929 - February, 1972 2,832 sterilization procedures are performed in Alberta (55 of these took place in the final year of it's authority). by james hörner

6. The Rest of the World Other countries that had notably active sterilization programs include Australia, Norway, Finland, Estonia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Iceland, and some countries in Latin America (including Panama).[In the United Kingdom, Home Secretary Winston Churchill introduced a bill that included forced sterilization. In Peru, former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) pressured 200,000 indigenous people in rural areas (mainly Quechuas and Aymaras) into being sterilized From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

7. The Story with the ROMANIES On May 26 th 1933, The Law to Legalize Eugenic Sterilization is introduced by the National Socialists (Nazi Party) in Germany. On July 14 th 1933, Hitler's cabinet passes the law against "lives not deserving of life" (Lebensunwertesleben), called The Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring. It orders sterilization for certain categories of people, "specifically Gypsies and most of the Germans of black color" (called the "Rhineland Bastards,“ 1934 To keep the Swedish race clean. Sweden pass a law on sterilization, which becomes harsher in 194l. Anyone, including Roma, seen as leading "a socially undesirable life" are to be sterilized. Sterilizing Gypsies was government policy during Slovakia's World War II 1972. In Czechoslovakia, a sterilization program for Roma begins. 1976. The Czechoslovakian newspaper Vychodoslovenske Noviny publishes the official text of government plans for compulsory sterilization of Roma as an act of "socialistic humanity."

8. ROMA NI Sterilization today Sterilization of Czech Gypsies Continues. Eugenics Policy Dates back to Soviet Era 12. 6. 2006 PRAGUE (Newsdesk.org) Gypsy women who say they were sterilized against their will by Czech doctors were heartened last December when a government investigator released a study that largely vindicated their claims. At a meeting in February, Natasa Botosova, 39, said she was sterilized in 1991, after giving birth to her fourth child. “The doctors ruined my life” "[Sterilization] was by no means a national policy, but errors [were] committed by individual medical facilities," said Jaroslav Strof, the Health Ministry's director of healthcare and pharmacy, in an e-mailed statement. Czech government's independent ombudsman, Otakar Motejl stated dozens of cases of coercive sterilization between 1979 and 2001, and called for criminal investigations and possible prosecution against several health care workers and administrators.

9. ROMA NI Sterilization Today PRAGUE, March 5 th 2006 — Slovakia's Interior Ministry has announced that it will look into claims that Gypsy women in eastern Slovakia have been sterilized. Under communism, which ended in 1989, sterilization was a semiofficial tool to limit the population of Roma, whose large families were seen as a burden on the state. Today, doctors defend the procedure on medical grounds, saying it is recommended after a second Caesarean section. RomNews Network Community @ RomNews.com/de

10. Conclusion Compulsory sterilization programs are government policies which attempt to force people to undergo surgical sterilization. In the first half of the twentieth century, many such programs were instituted in many countries around the world, usually as part of eugenics programs intended to prevent the reproduction of members of the population considered to be carriers of undesirable genetics traits. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia