This article is from page 4 of the 2014-03-11 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
BALLYVAUGHAN grandmother Ellen Moore is preparing to share the story of her mistreatment at the hands of the state with the United Nations Committee Against Torture.
Mrs Moore was given a symphysiotomy without her knowledge or consent while giving birth to her first son in September of 1965. She has been living with near constant pain for the past 50 year since the procedure, which she describes as like “being butchered”.
She will be in Dublin today to officially launch a complaints on behalf of Survivors of Symphysiotomy (SoS) to United Nations Committee Against Torture (UNCAT) and United Nations Human Rights Committee. The SoS group, who represent more than 95 per cent of the women who were given symphysiotomy in Irish hospitals, say that they are going to the United Nations as the Government continue to ignore their de- mands.
“We are getting absolutely nowhere with the Government so I we don’t really have any choice but to take this step,” said Ellen yesterday.
“We are meeting tomorrow morning to vote on whether to go to the UN, but I believe that that vote is a foregone conclusion at this stage. The details are not 100 per cent clear but someone from the group will go to Geneva later this week. I signed a legal letter last week to say that I am happy that the details of my case go forward to the United Nations and I would be more than happy to Geneva and tell them my story.”
Elizabeth “Ellen” Moore says that she has wanted to die on a number of occasions over the years following her symphysiotomy, which has left her in near constant pain and completely incontinent. This procedure, which involved breaking a woman’s pelvic bone during labour, was carried out on an estimated 1,500 Irish women in the 1960 and ‘70s but fewer than 200 of these women are still alive.