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Date/Time: 26 December 2018 - 09:30 to 13:00
Organiser: MS South Branch
Region: South
This week Willeke van Eeckhoutte delves into the universal experience of grieving after being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. From the ever-popular denial to the stories we tell ourselves and to being present in your daily life, read on to discover how she found her way forward…. Nothing is as numbing to the soul as being diagnosed with an incurable illness like MS. When that illness is also progressive and affects your brain, spinal cord and optic nerves, you can safely call it a double whammy...and a bit! In 2002 I moved to Ireland, the country of my dreams. At work, strong friendships were formed from the get-go and family members visited regularly. I was also studying for a degree in Psychology and when I had time to spare, I travelled around Ireland during weekends and holidays. Life was hectic and good. Fast-forward to 2005. Five months after experiencing my first MS symptoms, I stepped into A&E with excruciating facial pain and fatigue. These symptoms invariably marred my days- there was no number a pain severity scale. My diagnosis followed soon after... it still feels as if it happened yesterday. I remember what I wore, what I said, what I forgot to ask... as well as staring in my neurologist's eyes looking for reassurance. I also remember standing in the hallway outside the MS clinic, texting everyone, saying "I am OK! It's MS but I am OK!" Denial had arrived. "The illness is mine, but the tragedy is theirs." Third Star, 2010 Denial set in almost instantly. The visceral impact I thought would happen during the MS clinic, didn't. When my neurologist said I would have to change my lifestyle, I thought, "What an odd thing to say to someone who just changed her lifestyle when I moved to Ireland." "No can do!" I said afterwards to the friend who went to the hospital with me—and who I conveniently forgot to take into the consultation room with me. She later dragged me off to a fancy restaurant because in her own words, "I was so in denial!" Not facing up to the truth as a coping mechanism prevented me from going off the rails that day, so much so I was talking about the 'D-thing' in quite a matter-of-fact way. Family and friends were asking if I was OK as the lack of tears puzzled them. I asked them in return if they were OK because they seemed to make so much more of the diagnosis than I was. When I eventually went to bed that night, my thoughts were fragmented and skewed. I was happier knowing what was causing the maddening facial pain and relentless fatigue rather than being sad about the difficult journey ahead of me. I didn't see the need to quit my job nor the urgency to throw my life around again. This was a stance I eventually had to review 4.5 years post-diagnosis. This was diagnosis-denial 1-on-1 For about five weeks, I said "I'm fine!" Non-acceptance would intervene when new symptoms arrived and trigeminal neuralgia went up a notch. It stopped me from thinking about all the implications of such a harsh diagnosis. Before denial dissipated, I still had a litany of questions that required answers I couldn't find. I could be forgiven for not being even remotely aware that my body was in a slow process of relinquishing power and control? Did those glimmering lesions on my brain show up one day fully formed? Why, after just 2.5 years, did MS have to attack the life I had dreamt of? Please don't tell me family and friends will walk out of my life because I'm "just not the same anymore"? Have I just lost the best part about myself? All the above went unanswered because the time and effort spent on finding the right answers by being negative were more energy-sapping than being positive was. Interferon side effects helped drip-feed reality into my consciousness. Its numbing effect lost its potency, but I finally understood that being in denial is the opposite of having hope. Hope was where I was headed and hope is where I live to this day. Check out Willeke's blog Ireland, MS and Me
Apply now to become a Director We are currently seeking candidates including candidates with MS research or community development experience to go on to our panel of potential Board members. Members, Branches, Council, the Board and staff may propose candidates. All nominations must be proposed and seconded by Members. Nominations of retiring Board members seeking re-election must be submitted to the Nominations Committee. Other nominations may be submitted either directly to the Nominations Committee, or alternatively, under the provisions of Article 56 of MS Ireland's Constitution, nominations may also be submitted directly to the Registered Office (MS Ireland's National Office, 80 Northumberland Road, Dublin 4 D04 T856) and marked for the attention of the Company Secretary. The Nominating Committee will review all nominations, except those submitted to the Company Secretary under Article 56, and will recommend to the Board candidates to go forward for election by the Members at the AGM. Any Member nominated via Article 56 will have their candidacy put before the Members at the AGM. The Nominating Committee will take into account the range of skills necessary for board membership and where possible, the geographical spread, the gender balance, the experience and the qualifications of the candidates. All candidates must be in compliance with the requirements for Directors as set out in the Companies Act 2014, the Charities Act 2009 and MS Ireland's Constitution and will be asked to sign a declaration to that effect. The Nominations Committee, on behalf of the Board, needs to be satisfied that no candidate, who legally cannot serve as a Board member, or who has been disqualified or restricted from being a Board member, is put before the Members at the AGM. Closing date for receipt of applications Applicants, wishing to apply for a position on the Board in September 2019, are invited to submit their application form by 5pm on Friday, 31st May 2019.
20th Annual General Meeting (59th AGM since MS Ireland's foundation) Dear Member, In an effort to reduce costs and with the passing of our Constitution in 2016, we are now able to send AGM notices to you by email. However, we need your consent that you will access the accompanying AGM financial documentation on our website instead of by post. We will be contacting you by email or phone in the coming weeks to seek your agreement on this and to get your email address. Alternatively please complete the attached slip and return to Alice McKeon, MS Ireland, National Office, 80 Northumberland Road, Dublin 4.D04 T856 We would like to thank those members who have already consented to accessing the AGM financial documentation on our website. The AGM legal notice will be sent to each member by email (where we have an email address for you) or by post along with the next issue of MS News. The Annual General Meeting of the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Ireland, at which Board members are elected, normally takes place on the same weekend as the annual conference which this year is scheduled to take place on Saturday, 21st September in the Radisson Blu Hotel, Limerick (time to be confirmed). The results of the vote for the board vacancies and motions, if any, plus the council's nomination to the board will be announced at the AGM. The procedures for motions and board nominations are listed hereunder. Every registered member is entitled to a vote. For those unable to attend the AGM, proxy papers will be available on our website three weeks prior to the AGM and must be returned to National Office, MS Ireland, 80 Northumberland Rd, Dublin 4 D04 T856 before 5pm on Thursday, 19th September 2019. Ava Battles Company Secretary Motions Any member or branch may forward a motion to the Governance Committee who will decide on their acceptability for putting before the AGM. Closing date for receipt of motions is Friday, 16th August 2019. Call for Board Members We are currently seeking candidates including candidates with MS research or community development experience to go on to our panel of potential Board members. Members, Branches, Council, the Board and staff may propose candidates. All nominations must be proposed and seconded by Members. Nominations of retiring Board members seeking re-election must be submitted to the Nominations Committee. Other nominations may be submitted either directly to the Nominations Committee, or alternatively, under the provisions of Article 56 of MS Ireland's Constitution, nominations may also be submitted directly to the Registered Office (MS Ireland's National Office, 80 Northumberland Road, Dublin 4 D04 T856) and marked for the attention of the Company Secretary. The Nominating Committee will review all nominations, except those submitted to the Company Secretary under Article 56, and will recommend to the Board candidates to go forward for election by the Members at the AGM. Any Member nominated via Article 56 will have their candidacy put before the Members at the AGM. The Nominating Committee will take into account the range of skills necessary for board membership and where possible, the geographical spread, the gender balance, the experience and the qualifications of the candidates. All candidates must be in compliance with the requirements for Directors as set out in the Companies Act 2014, the Charities Act 2009 and MS Ireland's Constitution and will be asked to sign a declaration to that effect. The Nominations Committee, on behalf of the Board, needs to be satisfied that no candidate, who legally cannot serve as a Board member, or who has been disqualified or restricted from being a Board member, is put before the Members at the AGM. Closing date for receipt of applications Applicants, wishing to apply for a position on the Board in September 2019, are invited to submit their application form by 5pm on Friday, 31st May 2019.
This week we get to share in a conversation between two MS and Me bloggers, Fergal Hughes and Willeke van Eeckhoutte. Read on for their personal take on some of the issues MS brings to their lives. Life. It's tough. Life with MS is tougher than life without MS of course. That said, I doubt that any of us MSers would say our life is tougher than someone else's...anyone else's, MS or no MS! "Walk a mile in someone else's shoes" and all that. Still, MS does have more than its fair share of negative points and it gives us more than our fair share of 'bad days'. With our new friendship, we (Willeke van Eeckhoutte and Fergal Hughes) find we enjoy convincing each other that it's not all bad and that every cloud has a silver lining. REDUCED CAPABILITIES WvE: Life with MS put a big exclamation mark in my life... and I wasn't having it! No more hillwalking or thinking of chasing cows in the middle of nowhere only to realise there is a bull just 150 metres ahead of me! FH: Even though some capabilities may have been taken from you, you just need to remind yourself that you can still do what you can do and, well, you'll keep doing it. The goalposts may have been moved – personally, what I now consider to be a major achievement is certainly different to what it was some years ago – but I'm pretty sure you have the confidence and strength to deal with it and adapt. CONCENTRATION FH: Me, I work as a software engineer. This is both brilliant and not so brilliant. My job requires that I sit down for 8 hours a day. This means there's minimal call for me to be physical but it also means I get minimum chance to be mobile or to work the muscles. Also, my mind has to constantly be in tip-top condition … and with MS that can be a struggle. WvE: My experience is that lately, it seems that my concentration and memory have gone to tatters. My prospective memory especially has led to awkward situations because I agree to do certain tasks, but then I can't remember that I had to remember to perform that task. The intention is there and unless I sticky-tape notes to every wall of the house, I often find myself apologising. FATIGUE WvE: This is no joke. It takes 100% true grit trying to stay awake for five minutes once I put my head on my pillow. Can you imagine having a relationship like this? I have to watch episodes of my favourite shows five or six times to see the whole 45-minute program! What's your secret, Fergal? FH: Combatting fatigue is no easy matter, Willeke. I've found that a regular schedule for going to bed at a particular time every evening and getting up at roughly the same time every morning helps me … as long as I stick to it! As long as I give my body and mind the best possible chance, the closer to a 'normal life' I get. MY FUTURE FH: I'm a worrier. It's alright saying I live in the 'here and now' but shouldn't I at least consider the worst possible future … so I'll be prepared for it if it did happen. WvE: As a great philosopher once said, 'Don't worry, be happy'. Kidding. But hey, always remember, you can't control the future. You can maybe have an effect on today and this week but let the long-term future take care of itself. A BURDEN ON OTHERS WvE: I feel shut out when people tell me I don't need to worry about certain news, that I have enough on my mind already. I tell them again and again that they don't need to worry about what I live with, but I cannot convince them. Backup or tips needed here, Fergal! FH: No one wants to feel like a burden on family or friends. But come on, Willeke, we can't control how others feel. And anyway, we might be wrong! I KNEW I WAS DEPRESSED BUT WAS AFRAID OF REACHING OUT FH: I waited too long to get help and felt there wasn't much support available in my community. When I eventually found a therapist, it was expensive enough for the amount of time I was given. WvE: I'm sorry to hear that Fergal. People with MS need more readily available access to mental health services. Once I opened up, I felt relief knowing I was not the only one. Therapists might have group sessions also for 'people with chronic illnesses'.
Minister for Health publishes Sláintecare Action Plan 2019 outlining approach for delivery of Sláintecare and milestones to be achieved by the end of the year Minister for Health Simon Harris TD has today published the Sláintecare Action Plan 2019, outlining the project management structures and governance approach for the 10-year implementation of Sláintecare and the actions and milestones for 2019. The Action Plan, developed by the Sláintecare Programme Implementation Office, is a fundamental enabler in the delivery of the Sláintecare vision for reformed health and social care services in Ireland. Minister Harris said "Sláintecare will deliver a health and social care service that meets the needs of our population and attracts and retains the very best healthcare professionals, managers and staff. Our core objective is to shift the majority of care from the acute to the community setting to bring care closer to home for service users. "This will help us reduce waiting lists and waiting times and ultimately meet our goal of improving population health. Over a ten-year period, Sláintecare will deliver a service that offers the right care, in the right place, at the right time. "To implement this ambitious reform programme, it is essential that we establish a clear, accountable and structured annual plan for delivery, and the 2019 Action Plan that I am publishing today is just that. It is a detailed and comprehensive plan for 2019 which firmly establishes a programmatic approach to the delivery of the Sláintecare Strategy. "As the Action Plan sets out, considerable work is already underway to deliver on the commitments made in the Sláintecare Implementation Strategy. Earlier this year, my Department announced the appointment of eight new members of the HSE Board, one of the key recommendations of Sláintecare. Enhancing governance and accountability in the health and social care service is integral to Sláintecare reform and the new HSE Board will work with the HSE to implement Sláintecare." Executive Director of the Sláintecare Programme Implementation Office, Laura Magahy said "The 2019 Action Plan uses a Citizen Care Masterplan Framework to underpin the project delivery of the very ambitious Sláintecare Strategy. It is essential that all parts of the health and social care system are involved in Sláintecare as these actions will be delivered through and with these partners. "2019 will see us putting in place some essential building blocks to ensure that by the end of the reform programme, the right care is being delivered in the right place, at the right time." Anne O'Connor, Interim Director General of the HSE, said "This Plan sets out the key activities that will guide the reform of the health services in 2019 and beyond. The HSE looks forward to working in partnership with our stakeholders in order to deliver on these important actions." The publication of the Action Plan follows the second meeting of the Sláintecare Implementation Advisory Council (SIAC), chaired by Dr Tom Keane, which met on Wednesday 27th February. Sláintecare Implementation Advisory Council Chair, Dr Tom Keane, said: "This Action Plan is deeply rooted in the original vision set out by the Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Future of Healthcare, and one which has been informed by stakeholders from across the health and social care service. "As I know from experience, implementation does not happen overnight. However, with the keen focus on structured delivery that this Action Plan presents, I am confident that we have identified and sequenced the first essential steps needed to create the foundations for an Irish health and social care service that, in due course, will provide the right service, in the right place, at the right time". The key Sláintecare actions to be delivered in 2019 include the following: Workstream 1: Service Re-design and Supporting Infrastructure Scale projects to improve the management of chronic disease and older people's services so that care can be provided at or close to home Plan bed and diagnostic capacity to meet the needs of our growing population Prototype a Citizen Health Portal, continue EHR roll-out and explore scale-up of telehealth solutions Workstream 2: Safe Care, Coordinated Governance and Value for Money Define and agree a new organisational and operational structure for the future reconfigured health and social care service, including respective roles of the Department of Health, the HSE and regional and community organisations Develop a roadmap and policy proposals for how to provide universal services at no or low cost to the patient/service user Review the recommendations from the Independent Review examining the removal of private practice from public acute hospitals Progress the Patient Safety Bill Workstream 3: Teams of the Future Engage with the education sector and training bodies to agree new ways of training multidisciplinary teams Implement the recommendations in the Strategic Review of Medical Training and Career Structures Identify projects which support staff to work to the full scope of their licence to ensure that patients are seen at the lowest level of complexity possible Workstream 4: Sharing Progress Commence the development of an evaluation and reporting framework Launch the €20m Sláintecare Integration Fund for 2019 to test, learn from and support the implementation of new models of integrated care Roll-out a Citizen and Staff Engagement and Empowerment Programme which will be scaled and sustained throughout the 10-year implementation period Read the full Sláintecare Action Plan 2019 on the Department of Health website.
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26 March 2019: Yoga classes for people with MS, starts 8th January (ongoing)View all events


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Words are lyrics from 'Bittersweet' by Panic! At the Disco.
Yeah I don't even remember why I decided a crossover was a good idea.
This is what I do with the tiny bit of free time I have in school. Doodle things quick. (I do apologize if the anatomy is crap because of short timing.)

subset: commoncrawl


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BIENVENIDOS Y'ALL!!!! Welcome to our shop. The carefully curated items listed here are custom hand-pulled print editions and super rad screen printed goods. Most of the works included were created by Cruz Ortiz, but we are also excited to feature other works by award winning designers. Please allow up to 2 weeks for shipping. Most orders ship out within 2 - 5 business days. If you need it in a hurry, there's lil' charge. Holler at us to light the fire on shipments. SUPER MUCHO THANKS!!!!


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Human Journalism – best articles from periodismohumano.com
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By Monica G. Prieto (Tripoli, Lebanon) / Traslation Blanca G. Bertolaza
- Syrian activists create a private healthcare network to treat the victims of the repression in private homes
- According to Amnesty International, in government hospitals the patients are arrested, questioned and tortured even by the medical staffSome of the wounded are transferred to the north of Lebanon, where another network hospitalizes them and takes care of the expenses
The four young men lie in two rooms in one of Tripoli's main hospitals, bright and aseptic. They all have one thing in common: they were wounded during the repression in Syria and treated in private homes by doctors and nurses because they were scared to go to a public hospital, since the regime has turned them into "military bases", as Syrian activists and NGOs such as Avaaz and Amnesty International have reported.
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- The regimes start the online persecution of cyber activists in Bahrain, Syria or Saudi Arabia
- "There is a war going on in cyberspace", explains the manager of the NGO Insan
- The Damascus regime tortures social network users into giving up their passwords to get to other dissidents
The war that pits the Arab dictatorships against its population has been going on in the internet for some time. Each search for the words Syria, Bahrain, Libya or Yemen in social networks runs into an avalanche of abuse reports done by activists but also by their antitheses, messages from followers of the regime willing to discredit, humiliate and refute their opponents. From denying the very existence of the demonstrations to insulting the organizers and protesters.
"Of course the protesters are fired. I would fire anyone who skipped work", writes Bahraini user @mohamedhasan89 on Twitter, justifying the dismissal of 1,600 Shiite workers from their jobs, accused of having supported the demonstrations, as part of the regime's strategy to silence the protests. "The protesters complain that they are insulted when they get arrested. The next thing they'll say is that they gave them tea in plastic cups", satirizes @sheeshaBH. At least four people have died in the tortures that take place during the interrogations, and almost a thousand have been arrested since the protests started.
But the interrogators have a new question in their survey: the passwords for the arrestee's social network accounts. Because there is something new happening on the net: as the revolutions come to a standstill drowned by the bullets of the men in uniform, repression spreads through the internet. The dictatorships have recruited volunteers to thwart the cyber activists, especially dangerous because of their ability to summon people and especially because of their coverage of the events, to the unrest of regimes who thought that shutting off the press from their countries was enough so that nothing would come out. The videos, photos and comments uploaded on social networks are enough to show the regimes up and expose their crimes.
Mohamed al Maskati, head of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, found one morning pictures of his private residence going around the internet, as well as his address, phone number, picture and calls to "murder and do away with him". "It is the second time it happens", he explains to Periodismo Humano from a chat room in Manama. "The Government's supporters upload my information on Facebook, Twitter and forums, accuse me of treason and insult me". Mohamed plays down its importance because he is not the only one to undergo such harassment, but he denounces that the campaign of repression has reached the networks and crystallizes on Facebook walls bombarded with insults and threats, defamatory Twitter messages and offensive posts in the Blogs of the main activists.
In Bahrain, seven well-known cyber activists have already been arrested, three are missing and three more have been threatened, among them Maskati himself. Also in that list is Nabil Rajaab, president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights and active tweeter. Last Saturday, his home was attacked with smoke bombs: one broke through his brother's bedroom window. "We went through frightening moments rescuing my brother, his wife and daughter since they came close to asphyxiating. It is an attempt to murder members of my family to pressure me into quitting my humanitarian activity", he said to CNN. "Thank god the smoke bombs fell on the tiles and not on the rugs, they could have killed my whole family while we slept".
On Facebook, Maskati and other activists like Frontline Defenders regional director Abdulhadj al Khawaja, accused of "terrorism" by the regime, are showered with insults, although there is also a group created to support them. These are not isolated incidents. Suddenly multiple groups that support the repressing regimes have come up. Some reports are starting to come up on arrests in which passwords to private profiles are obtained amid beatings to trail other dissidents, as well as on interrogations about comments written on Twitter. And Bahrain is not the exception but the rule in the Arab revolts.
"We are witnessing this phenomenon in Syria, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Morocco, but I am sure that it also happens in all the other places", explains by e-mail Jillian York, Electronic Freedom Foundation's director for International Freedom of Expression, especially interested in watching over the infiltration of governments on the network of networks. "We had already seen similar scenarios in Iran, of course, and I am positive that as long as the revolts continue, we will keep seeing them in more places".
"There is a war in itself going on in cyberspace", asserts Wissam Tarif, director of the Human Rights NGO Insan. And like in every war, there are victims already. "Many cyber activists have ceased their activities because of the repression. And many Human Rights advocates have gone away out of fear of being arrested. Bahrain is not an appropriate place for them", explains Maskati.
It is a broad phenomenon. In Saudi Arabia, where there are some timid protests to protest for the discrimination of the Shiite minority, recently a Facebook group called Teach me to drive so I can protect myself has been shut down. It tried to make the traditional Saudi society aware of the need of women being able to get behind the wheel and called a massive female driving day for June 17th. In the Wahabi kingdom, where the most rigid interpretation of Islam is its body of law, cars are reserved for men, which forces the families to hire drivers who can take the females to work, to school with their kids or to the hospital. Manal al Sherief, promoter of the Facebook group, was arrested last Saturday by the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, the religious police. Her crime: uploading a video on YouTube in which she could be seen driving.
"How could Facebook have shut down the group? In theory, only the Facebook staff has the authority to close down a group if it does not follow the terms of use", wonders a Saudi journalist living in Lebanon. "This looks as if the Saudi regime has the power to close it down with one simple call", she suggests. Censorship did not stop there: the Wahabi dictatorship had no scruples about blocking, one day later, Omaima al Najjar's blog, a woman who had shown her repulse about Manal's arrest and demanded her liberation.
In Syria the situation of those citizens who film and upload examples of the bloody repression on the network to broadcast the crimes of Bashar Asad's dictatorship is dramatic. The activists report that the regime's followers have created Twitter and Facebook accounts and YouTube channels to spread their version of what is happening, according to which, terrorists paid by outside countries hide behind the protests and murder members of the Security forces forcing the repression, to maintain security.
In an article published by the New York Times, several Syrian dissidents explained how they had been, during their arrests, forced to give up their passwords to enter their accounts on social networks. Once they were set free, they found their walls full of messages supporting Bashar Asad. Moreover, the country's 3G network is starting to have blackouts to prevent videos from being uploaded on the internet from cell phones. Syria's telephone network is run by the governing family.
It is a desperate attempt to finish with the continuous leak of news and pictures of the repression of peaceful protests. There are an estimated 580,000 users with a Facebook account right now in Syria, 105% more than three months ago, when the regime opened to social networks pretending to be immune to the Arab spring, according to Fadi Salem, director of Dubai School of Government's Innovation and Government program. Not all of them used connectivity to denounce the regime's crimes: the most curious case is the Syrian Electronic Army, a Facebook group in which they explained how to attack cyber dissidents using technology. Facebook closed it down for violating its terms of use.
"The same way that, years ago, it became common to talk about the Web 2.0, now we are seeing Repression 2.0", explained Saniel B. Baer, assistant to the Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor in the US, in declarations to the Washington Post. The means are sophisticated judging from Hillary Clinton's declarations last April. "In some countries, democratic and Human Rights activists and independent bloggers find their email addresses hacked or their computers infected with spyware. Digital activists are being tortured to get their passwords".
It is a fact that Arab bloggers are being persecuted by the authorities. And that the generous, open Internet policy undertaken by countries like Syiria –opposed to the information blackout used by the dictatorship in Egypt to abort its revolt- has had positive consequences, but now starts to have negative effects. "Using [the Internet] for activism is a risky bet. It may work if the regime you work against is not rough or powerful enough. If you win fast, Facebook is the tool to use. If not, it becomes very dangerous", explains Peter Eckersley, another member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
But, will this cyber repression campaign end the Arab spring? "It depends on how effective or important the Internet is in this uprising", continues Jillian York. "In Tunisia or Egypt we have seen the incredible role technology has played, but in Syria, for example, we have not seen the same online activism, so cyber attacks have less impact. On the other hand, the way the Syrian regime uses the Internet to go after activists –literally getting their passwords and then arresting them- implies that some of the better-connected and better-informed activists disappeared, either because they are arrested or because they are hiding. Anyway, we are worried that the [cyber dissidence] movement will be, from now, less effective".
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- 48 doctors and nurses are tried by court martial in Bahrain for assisting protesters wounded in the repression of the March demonstrations
- Among the charges they face, conspiracy to overthrow the Al Khalifa dictatorship and illegal possession of weapons
- There is fear over their future being linked to the success of the national dialogue with the opposition that the regime wants to launch in July
When Bahraini doctor Farida Dallal gathered enough courage to appear on Al Jazeera, she did so with a black eye and a shaky voice, but determined. "They beat me with a hose, a big hose, in my arms and legs. They kicked me in the back (…) They humiliated us verbally with inappropriate expressions like 'dirty Shiite' and 'whore', they said to us that we are not worth a thing, that we cannot think, that we are not loyal, that we don't deserve our uniform".
The uniform the torturers said she didn't deserve is simply a white robe. Farida is one of the many healthcare professionals arrested and tortured by the Bahraini dictatorship, that doesn't distinguish between professionals when it comes to arresting and incriminating its population for the social protests that drew hundreds of thousands of people to the streets to ask for democracy. About a thousand of them are still in prison awaiting a trial, like the 47 doctors and nurses – all of them Shiites, the religious majority that the Sunni dictatorship accuses of wanting to stage a coup d'état- that last Monday went through the first day of their trial after weeks of arrest.
All of them denounced having been tortured, as their relatives told, a practice that on the other hand is usual in the Gulf kingdom. Only a few of them were allowed to see their lawyers before the process started.
On Wednesday, June 29th, 20 of them were set free in what is seen as a goodwill gesture to facilitate the participation of the opposition in the national dialogue session that the monarchy has called for July 2nd. It is the second partial release of the group of health workers, of which only 14 remain in prison. However, the charges have not been dismissed and all 48 of them still have to face a military trial. "I think that it is a political move, nothing more than that", regrets a lawyer in declarations to Reuters agency. "We have asked the court for their release in previous hearings. Anyway, this is good news for them".
The lack of judicial rights is common in Bahrain, but the trial against the doctors has caused the outrage of the international NGO's, who see how the kingdom of Bahrain, headquarters of the United State's Fifth Fleet and who maintains privileged relations with the West and its main regional partners, can impose a court martial on physicians who merely obeyed their Hippocratic Oath.
The charges that are attributed to them range from "incitement to overthrow the regime" to "illegal possession of weapons", adding "occupation of the hospital" and "taking medical equipment" in reference to the alleged theft of blood to exaggerate in front of the cameras the wounds of the protesters beaten by the security forces during the violent clearing of Pearl Square. For NGO's like the Bahraini Center for Human Rights, the professionals are tried just for carrying out their duty, as John Lubbock, in charge of the organizations' legal department, explains. "The regime is scared of these health workers because they reflect the non-sectarian nature of the protests. Their Hippocratic Oath means that they have to treat patients whichever their religious or political thoughts. They are a symbol of the unity of the majority against the Government's and their accomplices' oppression, and that's why they are dangerous. As long as the Al Khalifas can keep the people divided, they will stay in power, so they react particularly harshly against the demonstrators who protest under the slogan no Sunnis, no Shiites, just Bahrainis.
On that fateful repression of the first protests, in mid-May, the information that reached the outside came straight from the hospitals: the international channels got in contact with the physicians, who narrated live the brutality of the attack while attending the wounded. They didn't spare labels, probably because of the shock of having to see hundreds of people at the same time, many of them with shots fired by the forces assigned to protect them. It would not be long before they paid the price of speaking up in a dictatorship business friendly for the West but as ruthless as any other: in the following days of repression, the hospitals were surrounded by the Security Forces and, at a given time, occupied by the military, who arrested wounded people and even turned areas of the health centers into improvised detention rooms. Ambulances were halted and the workers forced to stay in situ instead of going to the repression area where the wounded lay. Afterwards, with the martial law and the occupation by Gulf troops, doctors started to disappear, and not only in big hospitals like Salmanya, the main medical center in Manama. A Lebanese-American nurse who works in a Bahraini cosmetic surgery clinic Human Journalism got in contact with admitted that in her healthcare center "two doctors have disappeared. They are both Shiite and no one has heard back from them".
Once the state of emergency that defused the protests came into effect, at least nine healthcare centers were combed by the officers searching for suspicious physicians. Dozens were arrested last April, among them, the president of the Bahraini Medical Society, Ahmed Jamal, and the president of the Nursing Society, Rula al Safar. And many of them reported tortures in declarations to NGO's and foreign media. Always anonymously, out of fear of retaliation, like this doctor's testimony obtained by The Independent. "The real torture started when they blindfolded me. They made me run around the interrogation room. I ran and I banged into a wall so hard that I got a huge bump on my head. The interrogators made me put my shoes over my head. They said that I deserved it because I am a "dirty Shiite" who works against our king and our crown prince". "They took away my robe because they said I didn't deserve it and that I had betrayed my career. They took photos of me while I was forced to dance and sing a song that said we all love prince Khalifa bin Salman. They hit me so hard they made me scream with pain, and then they yelled we don't want to hear you, you scream like a whore. Do you think you are with your husband in your bedroom? Do you miss him?"
In other declarations obtained by the British newspaper, the daughter of one of the arrested doctors assures that they "have been forced to confess that they only gave treatment to the Shiites and not to the Sunnis, that they stole blood from the hospital to splatter on the protesters and that they encouraged others to protest against the regime". It is a common denunciation that came up again in the first day of the trial, which took place on Monday in court martial. "We have been tortured into signing statements with false accusations", they told their relatives, according to the local NGO's who are following the trial. "I'm warning you that you have to say what we want you to, or we will beat you like a mule until you do", were the words an interrogator dedicated to a nurse.
For John Lubbock, the main reason that explains the arrest of doctors and nurses is that they are the most valuable "witnesses of the crimes committed against the protesters. They have seen the dead and the injured, they have experience and skills to spread the information about what they have seen, and if an international Human Rights delegation comes to Bahrain, they will want to talk to the doctors. If the regime manages to silence them, or to discredit them with show trials, there will be no more witnesses".
Organizations like Physicians for Human Rights, Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch have denounced these arrests as an inexcusable violation of international law. "The assault on healthcare workers and their patients is an extreme violation of the principle of medical neutrality and means a huge breach in international law", stated the first organization in a harsh report against the Bahraini authorities. Amnesty has gathered testimonies among the relatives of those arrested according to which "members of the Bahrain Criminal Investigation Directorate force the arrested to stay standing up for long periods of time, they forbid them from sleeping, they hit them with hoses and wooden sticks with nails, and they make them sign declarations while blindfolded". To Joe Stork, regional Human Rights Watch manager, there is no doubt that the massive campaign against doctors and nurses –at least 150 have been suspended and subjected to investigations- are "targets of the regime's revenge".
One of the consequences of the suspension or arrest of the most prestigious Bahraini doctors and nurses is that those injured -repression is still going on, especially now that the state of emergency has been lifted thus reviving the demonstrations- to not dare to go to the hospitals anymore. "Even those who have been shot and have bullets lodged in their bodies fear being arrested in the hospitals and tortured", denounces Nabil Rajaab, in charge of the Bahraini Center for Human Rights.
In the case of the 47 doctors and nurses subjected to court martial, their trial will be taken up again on June 13th. Their lawyers estimate that they could be convicted to 10-20 years in prison, but they fear that it could all depend on the success of the national dialogue Hamad bin Issa al Khalifa's regime wants to undertake in July. If the opposition is quick to make concessions, the physicians might be lucky; if it doesn't, their future is much more unpredictable. An intolerable situation for seven international medical organizations who have sent a letter to king Khalifa demanding the liberation of the arrested and respect for the healthcare sector. "We cannot remain silent", Stephen Soldz, president of Psychologists for Social Responsibility, has stated. Other international institutions don't think the same way, such as the International Automobile Federation (FIA), who decided to reprogram the Bahrain Grand Prix for October 30th after receiving a report about the "calm" Bahrain enjoys: only the objection of 11 of the 12 participant teams have gotten Bernie Ecclestone to change his opinion. To the FIA, the tortures in Bahrain are just minor sins. And they are not the only ones to think so.