Women at risk as Taliban curbs hit Afghan healthcare

Restrictions imposed by the Taliban are jeopardising the lives of women and their children who are sometimes denied emergency treatment, a U.N. human rights expert said on Friday.
Regulations require sick or injured women to adhere to a dress code, be accompanied by a male guardian and be treated by male medics, Special Rapporteur on Afghanistan Richard Bennett told a press briefing.
Bennett said women were frequently denied ambulance services without a male guardian.
In one instance described in his report submitted to the U.N. Human Rights council this week, a woman was left to give birth on her own at the hospital gate since ‌she was unaccompanied. Another woman lost her four-year-old son since she could not travel alone with him to a hospital.
“The Taliban’s restrictions must be reversed, otherwise they will be killing people,” Bennett told a press conference in Geneva.