Judge rules state coerced three HIV-positive women into operation by forcing them to sign forms they did not understand.

Namibia’s government sterilised three women infected with HIV without obtaining proper consent after forcing them to sign agreement forms they did not understand, a judge has ruled.

Judge Elton Hoff’s ruling on Tuesday, which rejected lawyers’ accusations that doctors sterilised the women to prevent mother-to-child transmission in a country where the virus remains endemic, was applauded by activists.

The activists say they worry more women in the southern African nation are coerced into the procedure, as other cases pending before courts allege women suffered similar treatment at the hands of doctors.

The three women all sought care at government hospitals in Namibia. All of them signed release forms that allowed doctors to sterilise them, though at the time they did not realise what they had agreed to, said Nyasha Chingore, an HIV project lawyer with the Southern Africa Litigation Centre.

In one case, a woman signed a form that used only acronyms to describe the procedure, while another signed after being told she did not have a choice, Chingore said.

“The consent forms were all signed when they were in labor,” she said.

Corinna van Wyk, the lawyer who represented the women in court, said the government had 14 days to appeal Hoff’s ruling.

‘Standard’ achieved

All three of the women will be entitled to monetary damages, though that portion of the case will be delayed as the court deals with other similar cases.

However, the major point of the case that women should have the right to be properly informed and allowed to make their own free decision about being sterilised has been upheld by the court, she said.

“Right now, all we wanted was a standard and we got that,” Van Wyk said.

Namibian authorities could not be immediately reached for comment Monday.

As many as 210,000 people live with HIV in Namibia, which is nearly 10 per cent of the population, according to UNAIDS, the Joint United Nations Program on HIV and AIDS.

Sterilisation is a drastic tactic to treat HIV-positive women, as mother-to-child transmission of HIV and AIDS can be prevented with medication.

However, that medical aid reaches about 58 per cent of pregnant women in Namibia now, according to UNAIDS.