State funding is provided to locate and compensate LA hospital forced sterilization victims
There is an effort underway to find and compensate the late 1960s and early 1970s survivors of forced sterilization at LA County General Hospital.
Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo announced the launch of this major state initiative to rectify the immense injustice. Carrillo got the ball rolling last year with the California Forced or Involuntary Sterilized Compensation Program, which included $7.8 million for an awareness campaign and compensation to survivors of forced or involuntary sterilization at state-run institutions, like state hospitals and prisons.
Due to a lack of research and information, the program did not include the survivors of unknown sterilization that occurred between the late 1960s to early 1970s at Los Angeles County General Hospital.
In light of this injustice, Carrillo secured another $300,000 for the Alliance for a Better Community to research these practices and the impact they had on the mostly Spanish-speaking, immigrant women who gave birth at LA County General Hospital and were sterilized without consent.
The goal is to find them and include them in the program.
"Defending a woman's right to choose is a fundamental value that includes the right to decide to become a parent," said Assemblywoman Carrillo. "Despite not being a state-run facility, LA County General Hospital followed what were then California's eugenics principles, which gave medical personnel the power to decide whether individuals could reproduce. The reprehensible practices left an indelible mark on the lives of countless women, permanently depriving them of their right to have children, and depriving them of their autonomy over their own bodies."
Carrillo tributes the 2015 documentary, No Mas Bebes, in bringing the issue to light.
