Globalization’s influence on women’s reproductive health can be felt everywhere – both in terms of equity and access. Law-enforced neglect of reproductive healthcare for women has often been identified as part of an explicit anti-feminism.
While specific state surrogacy laws restrict women’s access to reproductive health treatments, however, laws protecting female reproductive health are rarely or inadequately enforced. Any country’s economic development hinges heavily on productivity from all its people.
Women, who make up about half of the total population, were ignored, and their activities were limited to family and domestic. Social restraints and attitudes hinder women’s engagement in productive activities and jobs.
The sweeping waves of globalization and many fundamental structural changes in industries and other professions have made women more aware of their reproductive rights than ever before. Let us explore further what reproductive rights entail.
What is Reproductive Rights and Its Impact?
“Reproductive Rights” refer to women’s ability and right to make choices related to procreation and reproductive health – such as planning a family, ending an unwanted pregnancy, choosing her own contraceptives, accessing reproductive healthcare services or receiving sexuality education in public schools.
Given their moral, ethical, and religious implications regarding birth control, abortion, family planning and reproductive rights initiatives are often fraught with controversy around the globe. Reproductive rights remain emotionally and politically contentious, especially in light of new technologies and recent laws.
Human rights have evolved as a subset of reproductive rights over time. Women’s sexual, gynecological, and mental wellness concerns were not initially taken seriously. Still, as globalization increased, issues connected to reproductive rights were increasingly aggressively battled globally by the UN.
However, states seemed hesitant to incorporate these rights into globally legally enforceable agreements. As a result, while some of these rights have already been recognized in hard law, that is, in legally enforceable international human rights treaties, others have only been listed in non-binding recommendations.
Negative Impact
Regardless of the growing increasing impact of globalization on women’s health and wellness, it is worth noting that it’s not without a dark side. Globalization has made it more challenging to enact important drug laws that could control and regulate multinational pharmaceutical organizations. These pharmaceutical organizations advertise unnecessary drugs for women or may harm their health.
Also, under the pretense of globalization, there is an absence of state supervision on working conditions in industrial setups and factories. As a result, women are forced to labor in dangerous settings with no safety precautions and environmental norms.
Conclusion
Despite globalization having had a tremendous positive impact on women’s reproductive health thanks to increased education through electronic media and knowledge-sharing like how to balance hormones through diet among countries, women are now aware of their legal rights and various reproductive health issues.
At the same time, the negative aspects of globalization, such as unwarranted sexual advances, unpredictable time schedules, and the lack of legal rights to healthcare facilities, should be addressed by international bodies to provide legal aid, communication channels, and mentorship of migrant female workers.
