NHS is obscuring health info about women

FarNorth
Thank you for putting this up.
I’ve been aware of this for some time but there might be some posters who aren’t.

Yes, it is beyond belief, and I cannot understand the managers who go allow this to happen.

Strange how seeking inclusiveness means excluding women.

It is very strange that inclusiveness-driven change of wording isn't seen as necessary in healthcare for people with male anatomy.

Beats me how removing (i.e. excluding) words like woman and female could ever be counted as inclusive. It's like turning something upside-down and saying it's the right way up – bonkers, in short.

This tells you everything you need to know about women’s erasure.

Disgraceful SueDonim I can't believe this is considered acceptable in any way.

The charity Prostate Cancer UK was asked about this and they explained that their choice of wording is clear about who may be affected, in order to be as effective as possible.
Other organisations, including the NHS, seem to think this isn't necessary when referring to female people.

Of course it is based in misogyny.

I just don't understand how anyone, and particularly women, can think that this state of affairs is boring or some sort of side issue that only interests extremists and obsessives.

So Sajid Javid is blaming NHS England, which as Minister for Health he was in charge of until about a month ago? Sounds like a typical Daily Mail distortion/exaggeration aimed at running down the reputation of the NHS to me.

Casdon the article shows several examples of NHS information from leaflets, posters & websites.
Why do you say it is distortion / exaggeration when you can see it there for yourself?

Obviously NHS England doesn't usually have to refer to the Minister for Health concerning the wording of such things.
I don't know what's happening about it, now that Sajid Javid is no longer in post.

The Minister for Health is ultimately accountable for the actions of NHS England FarNorth, it’s as simple as that. There isn’t a person in a little office unilaterally deciding to change digital information, it will be led by a committee which ultimately reports to the minister via the NHS England Chief Executive. The NHS CE is a political appointment.

Casdon

The Minister for Health is ultimately accountable for the actions of NHS England FarNorth, it’s as simple as that. There isn’t a person in a little office unilaterally deciding to change digital information, it will be led by a committee which ultimately reports to the minister via the NHS England Chief Executive. The NHS CE is a political appointment.

I may be being a bit dim; but what has this got to do with the differing attitudes towards communicating with men and women (sorry - people with cervixes)?

I’m a woman but I don’t have a cervix. Where do I fit in nowadays?

Did you ever have a cervix, espee?

BTW, saying "only women have a cervix" is not the same as saying all women have a cervix.

Ditto wombs and other female reprductive equipment. We know that sometimes they are removed.

Can we claim our gender by our chromosomes please.

dogsmother

Can we claim our gender by our chromosomes please.

We can, and nearly everybody does, but it's sex we're claiming, not gender. Condusing the words and meanings of the words sex and gender is half the problem with gender wokery.

*confusing

Doodledog

Casdon

The Minister for Health is ultimately accountable for the actions of NHS England FarNorth, it’s as simple as that. There isn’t a person in a little office unilaterally deciding to change digital information, it will be led by a committee which ultimately reports to the minister via the NHS England Chief Executive. The NHS CE is a political appointment.

I may be being a bit dim; but what has this got to do with the differing attitudes towards communicating with men and women (sorry - people with cervixes)?

Direction is given to the NHS by the Minister, the NHS will not have made a unilateral decision to alter the wording on its digital platform without direction. Whatever committee decided this was required for women but not for men was obviously unclear in what was required.

I'm glad you've realised Casdon that this has happened and is not exaggeration or distortion.

Sajid Javid, as Minister, took responsibility for saying it is wrong to make the wording obscure for anyone and that the info for women should say clearly that it is for women.
Now he is no longer in post, I have no idea if this will actually happen.

It is completely ridiculous to try to be 'inclusive' by making things difficult to understand and absolutely astounding that the NHS is the organisation doing it.

I don’t understand your post FarNorth, I think we are at cross purposes. I didn’t deny that it had happened, what I said was that the article was an distortion/exaggeration, and I still think that. A minister cannot deny his involvement as the ultimate responsible person and blame the NHS, and the Mail has by implication forgotten that very important fact and made out Javid is the good guy and NHS England the bad, that is just wrong.

I am not defending Javid, nor am I carrying a torch for the DM. The point here is that whoever is to blame for signing off the policy, the thinking behind it (doubtless inspired by Stonewall) is reprehensible.

Since these decisions are made by consensus in the Ministry of Health, it presumably means that quite a lot of women up to a quite senior level in the ministry concurred with this degradation of their sex!