Woman's Hour - Calls for allergy tsar, Men and contraception, Judy Blume books

Episode Date: May 16, 2023

Tanya Ednan-Laperouse and Emma Turay are two women who lost their teenage daughters due to severe allergic reactions to food they had eaten. They are calling for the government to put in a place an ��allergy tsar’ to prevent what they say are unnecessary deaths and illnesses. They explain their demands to Hayley Hassall.'Ejaculate Responsibly: The conversation We Need to Have about Men and Contraception' is a stirring manifesto by American writer and award winning parenting blogger Gabrielle Blair. Why, she asks, are women expected to do all the work of pregnancy prevention particularly when men are fifty times more fertile than women? That’s one of the 28 arguments in her book which show in different ways how men take little if any responsibility for unwanted pregnancies. And yet according to Gabrielle, if you boil it right down all unwanted pregnancies are caused by irresponsible ejaculations. In a report out today the Independent Monitoring Board have found women are being sent to prison as a 'place of safety' whilst experiencing severe mental health problems. Some women were sent to prison because they had attempted suicide; some had been diagnosed with a severe mental illness and needed medication and there was no adequate community provision. Hayley Hassall is joined by the IMB's National Chair Dame Anne Owers.An adaption of Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, the bestselling book by beloved teen author Judy Blume is coming to the big screens this week. So, we are asking - what did the book mean to you? Journalist Leila Latif joins Hayley to discuss why the coming-of-age story is still relevant today and how Judy Blume’s books guided her through her own adolescence.Presenter: Hayley Hassall Producer: Emma Pearce

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Hayley Hassell and welcome to the Woman's Hour podcast. Now, if you or someone you know has a severe allergy, you'll know all too well the worry that exists every day to keep them safe. The deaths of 15-year-old Natasha Edna Laparouse and 18-year-old Shante Ture Thomas will have stuck in your memory after they both unknowingly ate foods they were allergic to. Well, yesterday, their mothers took their campaign for an allergy SAR to Parliament. They're both sat in front of me right now, and I'll be speaking to them about how it went in just a moment. But we also have an exclusive to Woman's Hour.

A report by Dame Anne Owers has found that women are being sent to prison instead of being placed in mental health care. Many of these women have committed no crimes, but are put in prison apparently for their safety. Well, Dame Anne Owers will join me to talk about exactly what she's found and what she wants to raise awareness of. And later I'll be joined by Gabrielle Blair who has written a book which says that unwanted pregnancies are the responsibility of men. And she lists in quite a lot of detail actually exactly why she thinks this and how we have to stop making women feel responsible for men's actions.

But I also want to know this morning, if you're a fan of teen literature, did you ever read Judy Blume as a youngster? Well, her books like Superfudge, Deanie, Tiger Eyes and Forever, they got me through my teenage years. But possibly her most popular novel, Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, has been made into a Hollywood movie starring Rachel McAdams and Kathy Bates. So her words are reaching a brand new generation. So I'd love to know if you were influenced by her or what teen fiction or children's books you read and loved, whether it taught you about relationships

or just made you feel less alone through those very awkward teenage years. Let me know because I'll be discussing the film and the books with journalist Leila Latif at the end of this programme. You can of course text me. The number is 84844. Text will be charged at your standard message rate. You can contact us on social media.

We're at BBC Woman's Hour and you can email us through our website as well. Or you can send a WhatsApp or a voice note using the number 03700 100 444. Data charges may apply depending on your provider. So you can find all our terms and conditions over on the website. But first up, you do probably know someone with a severe allergy or food intolerance. But the Food Standards Agency has estimated that 2 million people in the UK are living with a diagnosed food hypersensitivity. That's ranging from anaphylaxis to intolerances.

Natasha was 15 when she ate sesame seeds embedded into a baguette, which were not only invisible, but not recorded on the list of ingredients in the packaging. Shantae was 18 when she died of a reaction to a hazelnut, and her EpiPen had only a child's dosage in it, and the ambulance took more than 40 minutes to reach her. Well, Tanya, Edmund Laparise and Emma Turei are the mothers of those teenage girls. He tragically died. And they're here with me now because they're calling for the government to put in place

an allergy saw to prevent what they say are unnecessary deaths and illnesses. A government petition has gathered more than 20,000 signatures and consequently a debate was held in Westminster Hall here in London yesterday. Well, both Tanya and Emma were there. They join me now. Welcome both to Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Firstly, can you update me on what happened in the debate yesterday? Yeah.

So there were a number of MPs and we were really pleased. They echoed quite resoundingly our concerns and you know in the allergy world and that they had lots of statistics and that we've quoted through yesterday that one in three people now have um and some sort of allergic disorder and that we've been calling for a national champion it's been a call that's been made from the allergy community for over 20 years so all of the MPs were in full support and they all laid out some really you know well thought through and researched arguments supporting what was necessary and at the end you know there was there was a summary given that Dr. Claire Bethune had been appointed as a national speciality advisor for specialised immunology and allergy,

and that happened last year, October in 2022. This was something that the allergy community were not made aware of, and it came as quite a shock. We weren't aware of it. And I guess our initial response to that is that, you know, whilst we're welcoming that there is some recognition, what we need is a clinical, somebody who's trained in clinical allergy as opposed to immunology. Okay, so you were listened to. In a way, they're listening to you and trying to be proactive with this national advisor, but do you think it's enough?

No, we don't. We think that they are chairing a clinical reference group, which is led by NHS England, and they're acting in an advisory capacity. And we think that it is a step, but it's a step in, it's not a step that's big enough at all. And it's not a step that addresses the modern day epidemic in allergies that the UK is currently facing. And that is what the data is currently telling us.

This is huge at the moment, isn't it? Tanya, Natasha died in 2016 and you've campaigned relentlessly in this area for a long time now. Natasha's law of course came into force in October 2021. How has the law around allergies changed since 2016 and do you think it's been enough? Well excuse me Natasha's law came into full force in October 21 and that means now that if any food is prepared and packaged in closed packaging on the same premises it has to contain a label with full ingredients with the allergens involved so that meets a criteria and it's certainly been life-saving information for many people but that's just one area that was failing people with food allergies and it particularly obviously in our case you know it led to our daughter's death

but there's so much more that needs to be done and really what we discovered I mean we started the foundation following the campaign for Natasha's Law the more we scratch the surface of all the things that we need to do excuse me I'm so sorry that's all right go away we've got lots of time take your time thank you the more we scratch the surface the more we realize that a lot more actually does need to be done and so so, you know, calling for this allergy czar, which is really another name for an allergy lead, somebody appointed by government, but not a government minister, we need a clinician, someone that really understands allergy. The reason for that is that so many more people are becoming allergic, we have

one to two minimum allergic children now in every class across the country. And that wasn't the case 20 years ago. Even 10 years ago, that wasn't the case. And yet people are falling through the cracks to get up by 615% in the last decade. And it's also resulting in deaths. You both obviously feel that your daughter's deaths were preventable and this is why you're challenging this and charging forward. Emma, you've talked about what you see as a fragmented system, actually.

So how could an improvement in the way allergy services are organised have made a difference to your daughter? Well, in Shantae's inquest, they actually found 20 failings, which range from the categorisation of the ambulances, so the ambulance, so whether you call 111 or 999, anaphylaxis is a life-threatening disease. And as such, Shantae, when we called 111, she just felt unwell. And her condition rapidly started to decrease while we were on the phone for the clinician who called an ambulance. Now, I was on that call for over 40 minutes

as Shante went into cardiac arrest and I carried out CPR until the ambulance arrived because it was wrongly categorised as a Category 2 and they went to the wrong address. Now, that was just one of the many failings. Other failings were that, you know, our GPs who we rely on and we trust, they prescribed her with an EpiPen. She was trained in the EpiPen. When they changed her EpiPen to a different brand, Emerade, we were told, which is what the GP had been told by the clinical commissioning group, that no further training was required now had we've opened

it and read the leaflet we would have realized but you trust your doctor yeah and you trust the dosage that they prescribe to you for medication and shanta had a child's dose so it wasn't it wouldn't have been able to to sustain her had the ambulance have arrived in the seven minutes. That was the likelihood. So there's just a plethora of so many things, you know, the GPs not being fully trained in allergies. And actually, they are not allergy specialists. There's not enough allergy specialist clinics across the country. You get a different level of service. It's a real postcode lottery of, you know, people not having one clear pathway and one clear health plan that's been coordinated. Which as parents must be so confusing and terrifying, actually. When did you both

decide to come together and start campaigning together and trying to make a difference to this? It was following Shante's inquest. So we had met the year before, hadn't we? And my husband and I, we supported Emma and her family during the inquest. And when the Prevention of Future Death report came out, the coroner was very clear that there's a real call and need in this country for a national lead on allergy. Because, as Emma explained, 20 different errors, and every single one of them led to Shante's, could have on their own led to Shante's death. And so that call was made then.

And that's when we really started the campaign, didn't we? But since then, other coroners have been calling for the same following inquests of other young people and children. So this isn't two mothers coming together with, you know, with our own story. We're carrying on our shoulders the stories of other people. are also very aware that we are, for an allergic community, an allergic family, we are people's worst scenario. They fear what happened to us for them and their family every day. And so we do it for them. Well, 20,000 people have signed your debate. That's an incredible amount. I think you only need 1,000 to get it to Parliament. So you have gone above and beyond. But tell me about your daughters, if you can, because we're talking about them, but we want to know them. What was Natasha like? So Natasha was just joyful. She was really easy. She was an easy child. She was fun. She was a mix of tomboy and girly. She was really close to, she was a mummy's girl she was a daddy's girl she was a

bossy sister to a younger brother and she you know she was an incredible artist and she was really good at singing and art was just what she was just naturally good at and she she was just thinking about what she wanted to do for her a levels and she decided she wasn't going to do art and i said why not that's such an obvious subject for you. You'll do so well in it. She said, well, I'm not going to be an artist. I've decided I want to study law. I want to be a lawyer.

And I don't need art for that. And I was so proud of her. It was that 15, just thinking about her life and what she wanted and that maturity. It was just, you know, her world was her oyster, you know. Well, the world was her oyster at that time. I can tell she sounds an incredible young lady. And Shante, what was she like?

Probably the complete opposite. Really quite outgoing, very loud and bubbly. I think what people remember her for the most is just the wit and the amount of laughter that we had around her. She was incredibly funny. But there was a serious side to her as well. And very much like Natasha, she had just secured a university place to study law as well,

which was, you know that and she was quite the campaigner at school so um uh she was sort of applied for head girl and you know and whenever something happened at the schools the teachers would say we know shanty's coming because she was sort of a bit of the campaigner and so you know i think both our girls were you know sort of budding lawyers. And I just think what we're doing for them and that, you know, that sense of, you know, that sense of social justice. And, you know, I think they'd be incredibly pleased with what we've done. And we like to think that they're together, don't we?

Yeah, of course they would. And the way that you are working forward on this on this together it must be there must be things only the two of you can understand does that does that help you through the grief as well as the hope I don't know there's nothing that can really help you through the grief because it's it's your journey and everyone has to do that themselves but we understand each other's grief don't we um and we've got um I think it sounds it sounds a bit cliched but we almost feel a bit like we're sisters now we we kind of we've just kind of in tune with each other and what the other one is experiencing going through I'm I'm ahead a little bit of Emma's journey in my journey of grief. So I've sort of been able to just kind of lead her a little bit. But everyone, like I say, they have

to go through their own path. And how did being in Westminster yesterday feel? Or how did it leave you feeling? Did it feel, did it leave you feeling like you are working towards something, you know, that the campaign for your girls is heading somewhere? It was positive. It really was. So when the ministers, the ministers were all in agreement and they were actually in agreement of an allergy lead and allergies are. Then when the minister summarised, he left the door open and they don't usually do that. He said that he was willing to come into conversation with us, that they would have meetings to discuss this further before that happened and that he was leaving a door open. And we were told that that is quite unusual and that's very promising. And Emma, I know you've written a letter to Steve Barclay,

the health secretary. What have you said to him? I think we both echoed that our daughters' lives were entirely preventable. But we're coming together to save other lives. And we are highlighting what coroners, what clinicians, what families, what the allergy community are saying every year and what they've been saying for 20 years is that if we just put this one person this lead in place it's worked so well in other countries like finland and germany and you know where deaths are i think negligible and for anaphylaxis so if this system was in place we believe our girls would be here and that we you know I think we're just mums that are trying to help other people and to not go

through what we went through but equally I think we've got a duty I think most people know either a friend or an extended family member that has some sort of allergy and it is on the increase. We know you haven't got a final decision yet but we have had a government statement through and the spokesperson has said we've taken action to address the challenges people with allergies face by introducing a new legal requirement for food retailers and operators to display full ingredients and allergen labelling information on every food item they sell pre-packed for direct sale. And clinical advice and leadership on food allergies is provided by the clinical reference

group for specialised allergy and immunology services led by NHS England. Now, Emma, I know that at your inquest to the death of Shantae, the coroner highlighted the fact that there is no person with named accountability for allergy services and allergy provisions in NHS England and the Department of Health as a whole, and said that there is a risk that future deaths will occur unless this action is taken. So what do you think ASAR could provide that isn't already available to those with allergies right now? Well I think firstly I think we need a public champion who is an allergy clinician, somebody who fully understands allergies and it's not just food allergies, the breadth of the types of allergies that people have. And I think just really having sort of a real overview of the whole system. So we describe it a bit like a jigsaw that we've probably got the outskirts, but there's quite a large bit in the middle, which is that coordination.

And I think one person that really understands allergies that oversees it has that bird's eye view they'll quite easily be able to see where the gaps are and what needs filling in. So what is next for you both? What's next for us we're going to see this campaign through we're not going to stop until we get this allergies are in place. That's certainly one thing we're doing, isn't it? Yes. And then as far as Natasha's Foundation is concerned, like I said, there is so much that the more we uncover,

the more we speak to people, the more we find out where the issues lie. And these are quite serious issues. These aren't just, they're not gripes, they are often life-threatening situations where we realise where we need to move next. You're both incredible women. Thank you so much for coming on the show and talking about it. Your daughters would be very proud.

And thank you for talking so openly and honestly about it. Lots of people have been in touch with the show and are sending their messages to you. Here, Simon says, yes, we definitely need an allergy, Sar. Too many young lives wasted totally unnecessarily. And many more thousands hugely limited by fear of taking part in perfectly normal activities like the rest of us. It would be totally unacceptable for someone to say, well, if you have a wheelchair, you just can't expect to be free to enter this building. But you still hear people say, if you have a food allergy, you can't expect to be free to enter this building but

you still hear people say if you have a food allergy you can't expect to be able to eat out and also more here Michael said clearly more needs to be done to protect people with severe allergies but we're sidestepping the more pertinent question why has there been such a significant increase in allergies at the moment someone here I had an anaphylactic episode for the first time last year and must now carry an EpiPen. I don't know what caused it, but suspect food. My GP was very concerned and referred me to an allergy clinic. I've now got to wait 60 weeks to be seen by a clinic. And there's many more, which I'll keep you updated with. But thank you again for coming on the show. And please come back and let us know how it goes as well great thank you for having us now moving on to my next guest the american writer

an award-winning parenting blogger gabriel and gabrielle blair in 2018 gabrielle put out a twitter thread that went viral where she claimed that men are responsible for all unwanted pregnancies the tweets led to a book just published called Ejaculate Responsibility, the conversation we need to have about men and contraception. Well, Gabrielle asks, why are women expected to do all the work of pregnancy prevention, particularly when men are 50 times more fertile than women? Well, that's just one of her 28 arguments in her new book, where she suggests in different ways how men do take little, if any, responsibility for unwanted pregnancies.

And yet, according to Gabrielle, if you boil it right down, all unwanted pregnancies are caused by irresponsible ejaculations. Well, thank you for joining me, Gabrielle. It's lovely to have you on the show. We obviously can't cover all of your 28 arguments, but I wanted to pick out just some of them. First off, you start with biology and show how men are 50 times more fertile than women and also how ovulation is involuntary, but ejaculation is voluntary. What do you mean by that and what made you want to start with that one? Well, I wanted to start with biology because it really helps people see clearly what's happening here. It's when we say, when I say that ovulation is involuntary, it absolutely is. We don't get to decide when an egg is fertile, if it's going to be fertile. And even if you have a very regular cycle,

say you have a period every 28 days, your ovulation window can still change anytime within a 10-day period yeah so ovulation is very unpredictable and involuntary and then of course the opposite ejaculation is very predictable men's fertility is very very predictable we know men are fertile from puberty until death they're fertile every single day and but it's not 100% is it not all men's sperm is completely fertile and right so I guess we're talking about fertile men here we're talking about fertile men and we're talking about fertile women um for fertile men they're fertile from puberty until death every

single day and and their ejaculation is always again in consensual sex we're not talking about rape here but their their um their ejaculation is always voluntary so that means so they know it's happening when it's happening right so like i so my egg is fertile 12 to 24 hours a month which means that most of the time when i have sex i physically cannot become impregnated but every single time a man has sex he can potentially impregnate someone so that's why i want to start with with biology okay and before i want to go, I do want to clarify one thing, because your book isn't about bad men, is it? Or why women don't trust men to take precautions. It's more that men are responsible to as well. We're all responsible in this. Oh, absolutely. The book is written by someone who has great respect for men. It's

written by someone that's saying, Hey, man, we need your help here. We need you to step up and ejaculate responsibly. Women are already preventing millions and millions of unwanted pregnancies every year. We have an $8 billion pregnancy prevention industry, birth control industry that women are funding and using the products that we're already doing a lot of work here. I'm asking men to step up and do their part. I'm just asking men to be responsible for their own bodies and bodily fluids, because right now women are expected to be responsible for our own bodies and for men's bodies. And I'm asking men to step up and be responsible for their own bodies. And you say, you know, women do take most of the responsibility when it comes to contraception. But how did we get into this mess, as you call it, in the first place where women feel like they have to take the lead on this?

Well, it was really, I was thinking about abortion numbers. I had read an article, I was thinking about it and thinking about why there would be abortions at all when we have so many options for birth control and kind of thinking through that. And I had a light bulb moment where I understood really clearly why that might be. And that's because I have tried every form of birth control. As a mother of six, it might seem like I don't know anything about birth control, but I've actually tried pretty much every form available.

And was on the one hand, very grateful for them that I got to choose when I would have a baby. But on the other hand, really had a hard time accessing them, using the products and dealing with the side effects. And so I know just from personal experience how difficult it can be for women to be using birth control. And then, of course, I started thinking about male birth control and really was kind of in awe of how amazing condoms are and how what a bummer it is that gets such a bad rap and have, you know, so many myths about them because condoms really are the most accessible form of birth control. They're the safest. They're the only kind that that prevents sexually transmitted infections and diseases. There is no hormonal birth control that does that. They're easily easily available they're very um affordable you don't need a prescription you don't need to use them every day just when

you're having sex for for those moments where you're having sex so i anyway and how that's how i got thinking about it just the difference is between women's birth control options and male men's birth control options no i totally agree but i mean it's not the case that men aren't wearing condoms because if it was in the condom industry I totally agree. But I mean, it's not the case that men aren't wearing condoms because if it was in the condom industry would be out of business. I mean, is it fair to say that men aren't taking the precautions?

Men aren't being responsible. I do think it's fair. We do have a lot of women who are pressured to have sex without a condom, that it's a cultural, there are deep cultural things where men actually feel like it's a conquest if they can convince a woman not to use a condom, that they're somehow more manly if they

don't need to use a condom. This is not a controversial thing to say. This is common knowledge. A lot of women experience this. A lot of men experience this. There's a little quiz in my book. It's to try and point out the differences in power dynamics between men and women and really talking about, okay, women or men, have you ever suggested to a partner that condoms are uncomfortable to you? Or have you ever not brought up condoms, hoping that your partner wouldn't bring them up either and assuming that she was taking care of birth control. And this is super, super common. So the idea that men are resistant to condoms is, I don't think, a controversial thing to say at all.

Yeah, and this is definitely created a divide between our viewers, let me tell you, our listeners, because we've got lots of people getting in contact with me with both sides of the argument, actually. Here someone says, men seem so shocked when an unwanted pregnancy occurs. It's like they don't know that if they ejaculate inside a woman, there is potentially a baby. It's time for men to be more accountable for their fertility. Thank you for raising this today. But Tristan says, it's not just men's fault for unwanted pregnancies. Both parties are to blame, surely, not the woman or the man. They are both to blame. After all, it was both of you that had sex together in order for the pregnancy to even occur.

What do you say to people who say that, that it takes two to tango? Right, I mean, of course, the idea of 50-50 would be delightful. I would be so happy to see 50-50. Right now, what happens if I ask someone, okay, what do you mean by 50-50? The man will typically say,

well, a woman just needs to demand that a man use a condom. But what that's describing is a woman being responsible for her own body and for the man's body. We've just said the woman needs to do 100% of the work. So what I'm asking for is not 50-50. I'm asking for 100-100. I'd like women to take responsibility for their own bodies. I'd like men to take responsibility for their own bodies. If that was happening, we would see zero unwanted pregnancies. And that is what I'm looking for. I think this all started, didn't it, because of a tweet that you tweeted in 2018. And I've got,

I've got it here, actually, if I can find it. And I'll read it back to you. I'm sure you remember it, though, because it went viral. But you said, if you want to stop abortion, you need to prevent unwanted pregnancies. And men are 100% responsible for unwanted pregnancies. No, for real, they are. Sorry, I don't do that well without an American accent. But you also say perhaps you are thinking it takes two. And yes, it does take two for intentional pregnancies. I'm interested to know

what the reaction to that was, because it must have been huge. It was huge. So that you're reading one of 63 tweets in the first Twitter thread I ever wrote. And that was your first Twitter thread

you ever wrote. Yes, and your first Twitter thread you ever wrote? Right. Yes. And it is still viral today. If I check my notifications on Twitter, there will be retweets and arguments and likes and shares right this minute on that tweet from 2018 on that Twitter thread. So reaction was amazing. What I have found, and this is amazing, like I'm delighted by it.

Anyone who's actually read the entire Twitter thread or read the book and the book is short, it's easy to read. They really don't argue with me. The only people that argue with me and they do the plenty do plenty every single day. They've read one tweet. They don't have the context. They don't have the biology to back it up. They don't have the whole argument. Anyone who's read the whole argument really is into it. Because what are they going to say? Men should ejaculate irresponsibly? That, you know, men shouldn't wear condoms? There's, I'm arguing for very common sense things here. So I really haven't had a lot of pushback by anyone who's actually read the arguments. I find that really delightful. I'm so happy about it. So what made you do it in the first place? I mean, the first tweet you send and it's that,

what made you decide to tweet about this in the first place? Right. Well, so I had written some of these notes down. I've been thinking about them and didn't quite know where to put them. I have a blog. I have other outlets. But I had these were such a different tone of anything else I'd ever written. And then in the US, the Kavanaugh hearings, Justice Kavanaugh, he was being vetted for the Supreme Court. And I've seen a lot of politicians talking about women's bodies, talking about abortion was very clear to me. They didn't know much about the issue. They didn't care about it. They were just knew if they said they were pro-life, they would get a vote despite their actions. And it was really making me frustrated. And I decided, OK, I'm going to share this, these thoughts. And yeah, it instantly went viral. It

was again, I've been on other platforms. And yeah, it instantly went viral. It was, again, I've been on other platforms, I've had other things go viral, but Twitter is its own place, as we know, and it was, I immediately heard from all sorts of media, including in the UK, wanting to talk about this, it really struck a chord. And so what now? What do you expect the book to do? What are you hoping to change or happen next? Oh, I want massive social change. I just want us to think about things so differently. Right now, if I get in a car,

I don't have to think about putting on my seatbelt. It's just common sense. It's just a part of my life. But that wasn't always true. I grew up without seatbelts. I was one of eight kids. We had a Volkswagen bus and it was just like we'd drive around

and the kids would tumble through the back seat. But then when I was 16, they introduced seatbelt laws. I was just getting my driver's license. And at first I thought no one's going to wear a seatbelt. Then some really cool kids from the big city were visiting my town. They wanted to go joyriding. They wouldn't start the car until we put on our seatbelts. And I had an instant shift where I was like, oh, I guess seatbelts are really cool.

I didn't know. Seatbelts are cool now. Right. And I want people to not have to think about, will I ejaculate responsibly? They just know they would only do that. That some cool older brother somewhere has told them, I would never ejaculate irresponsibly.

I would never risk my partner's life like that. I would never risk her health and her job and just her body. Of course, I'm going to ejaculate responsibly. And I don't want to be a father yet. I don't want to be stuck with child support payments or the responsibilities that come with parenthood. I'm going to ejaculate responsibly. And that's, this is not a big ask. I'm not saying don't have sex. I'm not saying don't have pleasurable sex. I'm just saying be careful with your sperm. It can cause pregnancy and we seem to forget that fact. Yeah, let's make condoms cool. Gabrielle Blair, thank you so much for speaking

to me now. Your book Ejaculate Responsibility is responsibly sorry. The conversation we need to have about men and contraception is out now. Gabrielle, thank you so much. I'm Sarah Treleaven and for over a year I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy.

And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now. Lots of you are getting in touch with the programme about Judy Blume.

I'm speaking to a journalist about it later in the show because the film is coming out in just a week's time. Lots of you have been telling me about your memories. This one says, Judy Blume's books were such a huge part of my adolescence. I read every book avidly, as did all my friends. My friends and I actually did the chant in the movie. Are you there, God? It's me, Margaret. We must, we must, we must increase our bust.

I did it too, guys. Well, her books were such a comfort and helped make sense of everything changing. I'm now 46 and my friends and I have already planned a night out to the cinema to see the films and to recall the memories of those times. Another one here, I bought Judy Bloom book Are You There God It's Me Margaret 20 years ago. My granddaughter is 31 now and she used to stay over every weekend. She'd be about 11 when I would read it to her. It was perfect. She loved every word and we read it several times. I told her it had been made into a film. So we're thrilled. We're going to see it together. We're so very close. Thank you. Well, thank you for those. Please keep those coming in ahead of our conversation later in the show. But first up,

we want to know what lies you've told or been told for a special bank holiday programme all about lying. How has a lie changed your life for good or bad? Maybe you had an affair or you lied to get a better job. What impact did the lies have on you and why were they told in the first place? I'm totally intrigued by this one so make sure you message us or even better leave us a voice note with your story. Just to remind you you can text woman's hour 84844 text will be charged at your standard message rate and you can check with your provider for extra costs to contact us on social media it's at woman's hour or you can email us through our website too now we're going to talk to dame anne owers She's the National Chair of the Independent Monitoring Boards,

or IMB, which provides oversight of the treatment of care of prisoners. In a report out today, and it's an exclusive for Woman's Hour, the IMB have found women are being sent to prison as a place of safety

whilst experiencing severe mental health problems. Some women were sent to prison because they had attempted suicide. Some had been diagnosed with a severe mental health problems. Some women were sent to prison because they had attempted suicide. Some had been diagnosed with a severe mental illness and needed medication and there was no adequate community provision. Of six women sent to one local prison for their own protection, three, only three, had been transferred to a mental health hospital six months later.

Well, the women we're talking about here have solely been sent to prison on mental health hospital six months later. Well, the women we're talking about here have solely been sent to prison on mental health grounds. They have not been charged with other crimes. The report also looks into instances of self-harm by these women in prison, which we'll get into in a moment as well. But Dame Anne Owers, thank you very much for coming on Woman's Hour.

Welcome to the programme. Thank you. Can you tell us more about what you found because it's quite extensive but what are the headlines here? What do we need to know about? Well I think here we're talking about women who would not otherwise have been sent to prison except for their mental health concerns and as you say that some of the findings in our report are shocking. A woman who was wandering on a railway line, a woman who was threatening to throw herself off a bridge, a woman who had no home and had severe mental health

concerns, but there was no community provision. So, and in one London prison over a year, there was an average of five women a month sent on these grounds. We don't know the total statistics because nobody keeps the data. But what we do know is that these women are in prison. Prison is not the right place for them. It's not a therapeutic environment. And the levels of self-harm in women's prisons are increasing and are very high. 22% of all self-harm incidents in prison are from women and they're only 4% of the population. So that is also a very shocking statistic. And can I just rewind a bit to be clear, because these women haven't committed a crime, have they? Or even a small crime, are they criminals?

There may be a public order of hand, there may be public nuisance, for example, but, you know, for trespass, for example, but it's not something for which otherwise they would end up in custody. And custody is not the right place for them because the reason that they are doing these things is because they are mentally ill, not because they are criminals. And they need help, presumably, and they need a safe environment. Prison, I presume, is not going to be that therapeutic environment. What effect is putting these women into a prison setting? Well, it's not, as you say, a therapeutic environment. And so what we know is that the rates of self-harm among women are very high. There was one woman, for example, in our report who had 98 incidents of self-harm,

eight of which required hospitalisation. There was another prison where there were 295 incidents of self-harm in one month. There's one woman who was self-harming 20 times a day. These are women who are clearly ill and for whom prison is not providing the kind of environment that they should have. Can it make them worse, do you think?

Well, of course it can. Of course it can make them worse. For example, if you are very severely ill and your behaviour is very challenging because of that, there is a strong chance you'll end up in a segregation unit, in the deepest form of imprisonment there is. And that's not because of staff and mental health staff and prison staff aren't doing their best. They absolutely are. But it's because the need is much greater than the resources available

and prison is not the right place for such people. We talk on Woman's Hour a lot about how prisons are overstretched. There aren't enough staff to look after the prisoners that there are. So putting women who are vulnerable in that situation, who need extra care, surely it's stretching it to the max even more. Are they able to cope? Of course it is. Of course it is. And no one working in prison wants to be dealing with this.

And what we also know is that though there is guidance that women who are severely mentally ill should be moved to secure mental accommodation within 28 days that doesn't happen that that is that is not routinely happening and that's and i think what we need to look at is the other side of the equation and that is the absence of sufficient community provision, either mental health care in the community or mental health care in secure establishments. There simply isn't enough of it. Well, I was going to ask, where can these women go? Is there anywhere else to put them? Is there any solution? Well, the solution is, and always has been, providing proper care in the community. What we know at the moment, for example, is that Parliament is debating a mental health

bill which says that women should not, any person, should not be sent to prison solely on mental health grounds, should not be sent to prison as a place of safety, and that there should be a statutory time limit of 28 days for moving people into mental hospitals. Now, that's all great, but it's a bit like having a bill that tries to prevent homelessness without building any houses. Unless you're going to provide proper accommodation, proper services in the community, there is nowhere else for these women to go at the moment. And we are going in entirely the wrong direction on this, that when the female offender strategy was published in 2018, the promise was that there would be more community care, that there would be alternatives to custody, that it would reduce the number of

women in prison. What we've seen now in the most recent prisons white paper produced by the government is 500 more prison places for women. Now that for me is entirely the wrong way, the wrong place to invest. We need to be investing in not prison, not investing in more prison. How do you feel about that when you saw that white paper? Well, just that, as I say, that it was going in the wrong direction. But what we know is that there should be more appropriate settings for women in all kinds of areas, but most particularly for women with mental health concerns, where prison is not the right place to deal with those concerns. And is it happening to women more than it is to men?

We don't know that the use of these powers is happening more for women because we don't have the statistics. But what we do know is that self-harm and mental illness among women in prison is high and higher than in the male population. So we know that we have got a serious difficulty in prisons and that it is much more acute for women. So who is to blame then? In your eyes, who do you think is at fault here? Why is this happening? Well, it's happening because we're not investing sufficient in mental health services outside

prison. Prison is being used as a capacious mental health provision because there aren't enough services outside. What we need is a redistribution of resource so that there is resource available in the community, available early so that women do not get into crisis and men don't get into crisis for that matter. But that we don't use prison as the default setting for women who need mental health support. Well, the government have sent a spokesperson and told us that while custody is always a last resort for women, with numbers having fallen by a quarter since 2010, we remain committed to ending the use of prisons as a place of safety. We are investing millions into community services like women's centres and drug rehabilitation, so even fewer end up in prison, and continuing to improve support for the most vulnerable women

by providing specialist support for psychological trauma, round-the-clock helplines and improving training for staff. What do you say to that, Anne? Well, that would be great. I mean, I would look for... Well, they say they're doing it. But what have you seen? It's not happening now, is all I can say. The statistics that we've just produced, that we've just been talking about,

the extent of self-harm in women's prisons, the extent of mental illness in women's prisons, shows that this is not happening now. And it would be wonderful if the resource and the thought and the planning went into that. But it needs to be there now, not as a promise. Thank you, Anne. Thank you for coming on the show. That's Dame Anne Owers, National Chair of the Independent Monitoring Boards, which oversee care of prisoners. Now, Enna Miller has been talking to teenage girls, asking for their thoughts and feelings on a range of issues.

So Saskia, Francesca and Olivia all go to school in Glasgow. Enna starts the conversation by showing them a photo. Listen to this. Here's me at 13. My mum had to make me look 15 because she wanted me to go and see something at the cinema. So she dressed me up in a leather jacket. You look good. Are you being sarcastic? No, I'm being full on. You actually look really cool. So I had my leather jacket on, my leather skirt, my red shirt,

a pair of ankle socks and black wheat high heels these were my friends and you can see the sort of style is very much jeans baggy jumpers and stuff and actually leg warmers were in so I just wondered clothes are clothes important definitely yeah clothes are very important to like identities I think like your style. Because you've got the goths, you've got the emos, you've got the punks, you've got the chavs, you've got the neds, you've got all of them.

You've got all the different, you've got the night techs, they have their own category. What's the night techs? They're these track suits that are obviously Nike and they're quite Oh, Nike techs, I thought you said night techs. No, but every single boy in our year wears it and it's just a carbon copy of each other.

And it's just so boring because you see them coming in a big horde and just night tics. They travel in a group of about 30 and they all smell the same. They never wash them because they always have them on, obviously. It's almost like they're stuck to their skin. I seal a lot of my sister's clothes. She's five and a half years older, but we're the same size, so I am wearing her jumper currently,

but I really like some of the clothes that she has. I'd say Saskia's style is also quite kind of 80s, like the jeans. If you put Saskia in the background of like an 80s film she'd blend in they compliment something that i think olivia you said to me once where style at school is very important so there's people that they're literally right out the school book they just wear exactly what they're supposed to and then there's people who would wear a bright green hoodie over and they wear like shorts and yellow shoes. The kids who wear that are usually, like, the spotty kids.

And then there's the people who just don't wear a school uniform. They just wear leggings and a pink hoodie. And then there's people who have put a lot of effort into their outfit. A lot of effort into their school outfit? Yeah, into their school outfit. So they've got jeans and they've maybe got like a belt on with them and then they've got different like cool socks on and their shoes and they've maybe got like a design on their shoes and then they've got

like layered kind of on their top half they've got like a vest and then they've got their school type and then they've got a hoodie so they're still have one bit of school uniform but it's still their own unique part what do you wear what's your style the whole thing about people like wearing shorts very short up personally i don't feel very comfortable doing that but other girls might and good on them good on them feeling comfortable i mean i'll cheer them on i'll like support them I just personally wouldn't wear anything that's too short out because of the men in the world that are going to cat call me when they probably have a daughter the same age as me up the road we've had quite a few experiences with old men not old men just like just being rude and stuff and I'm like it's none of your

business just leave us alone we're 14 let us be happy well that was Anna Miller there um talking in a part of our series Girls World now we're moving on to Judy Blume lots of you are getting in touch with the show about this because the adaptation of the best-selling book Are You There God Me, Margaret, hits the cinema this Friday. It's already getting five-star reviews. The book was, of course, written by the beloved teen author Judy Blume in 1970. She's written 29 books that have sold almost 90 million copies. So as a new generation of fans begin falling in love with the author,

we wanted to ask, how did reading her books help you navigate your adolescence? They were loved by many, but they were also controversial to others. Her books have been occasionally banned in the US for their openness about sex, menstruation, bullying and other teenage concerns. But her words have definitely touched the lives of many young girls. Well, with me now is journalist Leila Latif and she's one such fan. Leila, how did you come to read Judy Blume? Who introduced you to her and what did you think at first? I kind of started with her younger books Superfudge and you know those kind of ones that she wrote for kind of eight-year-olds, seven-year-olds and then you know I think like a lot of people my mother knew that I needed a lot of information, but she kind of felt a bit uncomfortable having it with me.

So a lot of Judy Blume books were just kind of a pair around the house. And that's how I learned about a lot of things that I probably would have felt actually too awkward to talk to my parents about. So I loved them, but I feel like they also kind of raised me. Really? So how do you feel that they spoke to you and had an influence on you? I mean, the thing that I find amazing about them is I didn't realise they weren't contemporary books. The only clue that I had is that I had an early edition of Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, and the sanitary towels were on belts. And that kind of gave me a clue that like, maybe this wasn't actually specifically about my teenage years. But yeah, I just felt like all of those sort of embarrassing feelings of shame

and kind of like the feelings around starting your period, about your body changing, about like, you know, how desperately you want your first kiss and how like actually difficult the dynamics between your friends can be as a teenage girl. She just gets it in a way that kind of, I think, really stands the test of time. And they're timeless, aren't they? In a good way. I love to think that teenagers are still having those same feelings that I was having back in the 80s. It's brilliant to pick up the book and still feel like you can relate to it.

So why does Judy's writing, I suppose, keep inspiring generation after generation? I mean, after this film, I'm sure it will inspire a whole new generation um I guess a lot of it comes down to like she kind of seems to connect to something that's like very very intimate and very like personal to teenage girls because even though she was writing them in the 70s I mean she would have been a teenager you know a couple of decades before that so she's just always had that ability to kind of get back into the mindset and I don't it's just a type of empathy that I think so few people actually possess in the same sincere way that she does and I think that's why generations after generations she keep coming back to them and I can't wait to kind of do the same with my daughter and start

scattering around the house for her to discover yeah it's it's a good plan. Just leave them surreptitiously around for them to find. I mean, I read Superfudge and Deanie and Are You There, God? And I kind of read it blushing and wanting to hide away. But at the same time, it allowed me to not feel alone anymore because I knew that the characters were going through exactly what I was going through. And I think lots of people are relating. Rachel has just emailed in to say, I'm so pleased that Are You There God It's Me Margaret has been made into a film. It was an important book for me to read as a young person as I know it was for generations before me.

I have even written about it. Thank you Judy Bloom for being one of many helping people to destigmatize and demystify menstruation and this one says, Judy Bloom wrote so accurately about teen awkwardness, embarrassment and shame, and those simple moments adults sweep over, yet young girls feel mortified by, feeling that are often brushed aside as silliness. Judy wrote them as real and profound. She was a brilliant writer.

And I can totally relate to that. I remember there's a scene where they go bra shopping. The girl goes bra shopping with her mum, and I had to do that, and it was just so awkward the first time. But knowing someone else a scene where they go bra shopping, the girl goes bra shopping with her mum and I had to do that and it was just so awkward the first time but knowing someone else had gone through it in the book was great. It makes us all feel part of a club doesn't it? It does and it's like you know that these are real

problems and this is like a real human and like giving a bit of weight to these things rather than just kind of all silly teenage girls who really kind of cares what they're up to and the film really captures that again. I was nervous sitting down to watch it the first time and relaxed after two minutes because I was just like, they've done it, this is Judy, this is Margaret.

But another side to the books is the fact that it was one of the most banned books in the US because it wrote about periods of masturbation and sex. And actually someone has just written in to say, regarding Are You There God, It's me, Margaret. This book helped me enormously during my confusing years of puberty. But at the age of 12, I took it to school to share with the other girls. And I had it confiscated by my teacher. I had to collect it from the end of the day from the staff room. It was a totally shaming experience that stayed with me. I'm now 49, but I still remember it clearly. That's from Jane.

And obviously there are certain people, even parents now, who think that their children shouldn't be reading Judy Blume. I mean, that might not be because they don't agree with it. It could be because they want to be the ones to explain it to their children

or they think it's too young. But I suppose there is an argument that books of that nature are not right for that age group. I mean, there goes me, Margaret. I mean, it's menstruation. It's something that happens to a lot of people. I mean, kind of thinking back, I don't understand how that could ever really be like a massive taboo.

I know Dini was a little bit more controversial because it had, you know, kind of, you know, she's exploring her and her own body a bit more. But to me, that's also such an incredible book about like figuring out your identity as a young woman, because it's always in that book that she's the pretty one and her sister's the smart one. And like actually gaining autonomy. I mean, that's so much more interesting to me, it's so much more valuable as a teenage girl to read than if they have something that's kind of about private parts. Do you think it's relevant to today still? I mean, so many books that I read with my kids are about superpowers and just crazy pets. But do you think there is a need for the voice of Judy Blume still in our normal everyday lives. Oh, 100%. I think so much of it seems to just be getting harder for these young people because it's all so online

and it's like you have to kind of do things perfectly and look a certain way and kind of conform in all these other ways and everything's being kind of, you know, held up on social media. And I think, like, these books kind of forgive you for feeling insecure, feeling a bit imperfect, having awkward or slightly embarrassing moments they think they're really comforting so yeah and you've seen the film haven't you I have uh tell me all about it what do you think of it oh I thought it was wonderful it's got a lot more of the mother

in it than the book has so we've got Rachel McAdams who's playing the mother and she's kind of going from being um a teacher to a housewife. They're moving to the suburbs and stuff. And, like, I think for me, obviously, you know, I'm, you know, a lot older. I could kind of see a lot of myself in, like, her journey as well. And, yes, Benny Safdie is just so wonderful. He's, like, this lovely herb who always just seemed like one of the most incredible literary dads to me. And then Kathy Bates is just so wonderful as like the grandmother.

She plays the grandma, doesn't she? The grandmother. And I just remember that grandmother from that book so well because I've always adored my grandmother. And like that can just be such a special relationship in people's lives. So seeing that in the book and seeing that on screen, just like really just, it's just a joy. And you're right.

You get that stress of being a mum in this age when you have got you're looking after the kids but you've also got a job and you're also trying to be everything at school and you've got your your mum having a go at you about certain things you can completely put yourself in the mix it does as you say hit many generations actually yeah and I think it kind of also like does help you forgive yourself a bit as a parent because I mean a lot of the parents in Judy Blume's books are lovely people. I mean, that's not very much in the way of horrible or abusive parents, but they can get things wrong

because it's quite difficult to communicate across the generations. So help me forgive my foibles as a teenage girl and is now kind of giving me a bit more permission to accept that I'm probably not going to be the perfect parent every single day. Well, Leila, thank you so much for telling us about it. I know that Judy Bloom said she didn't want it made into a film for the last 50 years, but she's finally given in and I think we'll all be grateful for it. I'll be definitely going to watch it. But thank you so much. It's been lovely to have you on the show. And you are still commenting on the Judy Bloom topic we've got

this morning. Yolanda says, I have vivid memories of feeling mortified having to read about periods in Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret. To my male five teacher, Mr. Stanley. Gosh, imagine having to read it out loud. It's not the book for that, is it? And Fiona says, S.E. Hinton was a favourite author of mine, especially The Outsiders. That was then, This Is Now and Rumblefish. They really spoke to me. And although they were fiction, I really believed in the characters. I loved them. Well well thank you so much for being with me today and thank you to all my guests as well I'm here in this lovely seat tomorrow where I'll be speaking to actor Saran Jones she's back on our screen soon with Maryland a three-part drama about two sisters so I'll be looking forward to speaking to her tomorrow thank you so much for being with me bye-bye well thanks for listening

there's plenty more from Woman's Hour on BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm John York and I want to tell you about Opening Lines, a series from BBC Radio 4, in which I'll be looking at books, plays, poems and stories of all kinds that have made a mark and asking, what makes them work? I mean, this stuff is jaw-droppingly shocking. I'll be asking lots of questions. What's at the heart of the story? How does it achieve its effect? What makes it special? History is usually written by winners, but he wants to give a voice to people who are not usually heard.

I'll be hearing from people who know and love these works. Writers. We do have an orgasm evoked on the page. Dramatists, biographers. It's worn better as a book about England than it has as a book about sex, I think. And directors too. In the end, I'll be asking, what makes this work worth reading now? Join me to find out in opening lines from BBC Radio 4 and available on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered.

There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this?

What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story. Settle in.

Available now.