Woman's Hour - The vegan stock car racing driver Leilani Münter, Lynne O'Donnell, Abortion stories

Episode Date: July 25, 2022

The BBC’s first Green Sport Awards has announced the winner of its Evergreen Award. Leilani Münter is an American former professional stock car racing driver whose environmental activism has been central to her career. Leilani used her race car as “a 200mph billboard” to get environmental messages in front of the 75 million race fans in the USA. Leilani joins Emma. A new reoprt by MPs says the NHS in england is facing its worst staffing crisis in history. Women make up 77% of NHS staff. Dame Jane Dacre is a Professor from UCL Medical School and contributed to the report joins Emma alongside Dr Radhika Vohra who is a GP and menopause specialist. It’s almost a year since the Taliban took power in Afghanistan. Lynne O’Donnell has years of experience reporting from the country and decided to return earlier this month. She says she was detained, abused and threatened by the Taliban. Lynne is safely out of Afghanistan and joins Emma Barnett. Following the overturning of Roe v Wade in the US more women have talked about having had an abortion but many never speak openly about their experiences. In a series first broadcast in 2019 we hear five different personal testimonies from women. Today, a woman who felt her mental health was at risk when she found she was pregnant 10 months after the birth of her third child. Presenter: Emma Barnett Producer: Emma Pearce

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Emma Barnett and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to the programme. It is good to be back after a week away. And a new Prime Minister is in the offing, I hear. Now there are two in the race, with one being the Minister of State for Women and Equalities, no less. We shall see and hear and watch the first BBC debate this evening, their first head-to-head, Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss. My colleagues are looking after that tonight on TV and on the radio.

It should be very interesting indeed. But regardless of the battle lines being drawn up by Sunak and Truss's respective campaign teams, NHS staffing in England has been catapulted today onto the national agenda and should be, many argue, top of a new leader's in tray. This is because of a new MP's report which says the NHS in England is facing its worst staffing crisis in history. It found England is now short of 12,000 hospital doctors and more than 50,000 nurses and midwives, calling this the worst workforce crisis in the NHS's history. Women make up 77% of NHS staff. 77%. So if you're listening to this, perhaps you were working a night shift, maybe you're not

working today, maybe you're about to go in, or maybe you're listening to this, perhaps you are working a night shift, maybe you're not working today, maybe you're about to go in or maybe you're listening to this later. I'd like to hear from you. How is it on the ground? If you are working in the NHS, if you are trying to deliver whatever service it is you are tasked with, what is it like? Of course, last week, the government published its women's health strategy. But you could argue, what is the point in one if there are fewer and fewer people to deliver it? Or if those who are there are not in a situation where perhaps they feel the healthiest themselves? There are many, many questions around this, and there are also your insights. So please do get in touch with me this morning to let me know

your take on this and what life is like working in the NHS at the moment. Of course, it can be incredibly fulfilling. It's not to take away from that. But there's a crisis in staffing and that has knock-on effects. 84844 is the number you need to text me here at Woman's Hour. I should say, as I always do, text will be charged at your standard message rate. On social media, we're at BBC Woman's Hour

or email me through the Woman's Hour website. Also on today's programme, one of your incredibly powerful and personal stories that you were brave enough and generous enough to share with us. And you'll be hearing from a woman ahead of the pack, on the racing track and in other fields, being awarded for her environmental activism. All to come, so stay with me. But it is almost a year since the Taliban took power in Afghanistan. In the intervening months, girls have effectively been banned from

secondary schools across the country, women have lost their jobs, and have been prevented from travelling without a male chaperone. There's mass poverty, as millions are at risk of starvation, according to the UN's World Food Programme. Most journalists left Afghanistan last August when the Taliban took over. They had to. But one journalist went back very recently. Her name, Lynn O'Donnell. Lynn, good morning. Hi, Emma. Thanks for having me on. Thanks for coming on. I'm happy we can talk freely like this because you only very recently went back. Tell us a bit more about the journey back to Afghanistan and what drove you. Well, I went back last Sunday on the 17th because, as you said, it's almost a year since the Taliban

came back to power and the republic that our tax dollars supported for 20 years fell ignominiously. And there's been an awful lot of change, a lot going on, and I really wanted to go and see for myself what the conditions are like on the ground for Afghan people. So that was my motivation. How was it getting back in? It was easy. I went by the book, Emma.

I had a valid media visa from the London embassy I arrived in Kabul in good order and I did what you're supposed to do as you arrive as a foreigner I registered there handed over a little passport picture and I knew also that I was meant to register as a visiting foreign correspondent and so I went the next day to the foreign ministry to have a meeting with the person who calls himself the spokesman for the foreign ministry, he uses a false name. And I presented myself as I told him in good faith to register my presence in the country. Because your exit wasn't as easy and wasn't as straightforward and came in very different circumstances. Before we get to that, when you were there, could you tell us a bit about what you saw, what you found, what you were able to report about people's lives?

And I know also you'd been looking specifically as well as the changes to women's lives. Yeah, indeed. I didn't go with any real idea of what stories I was going to do. I wanted to see what the situation was. You know, I lived in Kabul as a correspondent for quite a number of years. And really, it's probably, it was the busiest place I've ever lived and worked. Back to back stuff going on. I was running big, busy frontline news bureaus. There was never a minute of the day that there wasn't something going on. I was running big, busy frontline news bureaus. There was never a minute of the day that there wasn't something going on. And gridlock in the streets, you know, traffic bumper to bumper and shops were full and vibrant cafe society and all of that sort of thing. It was quite a dynamic place. So I arrived on Sunday and the feeling was palpably different to that. It was very, I found a very sad place. And I know that sounds a little bit trite and easy to say, but there were no smiles and there was no traffic. The Taliban have been confiscating, is the word for it, private citizens' vehicles.

The price of petrol has doubled. It's around $1 US, 20 a litre, double what it was a year ago. The price of bread is the same, but you get a third of the amount of bread as you did a year ago. And people that I went to meet, I knew I was only going to be there for a short time. So I crammed the meetings in as much as I could. And people that I met with spontaneously, unilaterally said to me, we're living in a reign of terror. The Taliban are instituting a neighborhood watch style monitoring system where people are being encouraged to spy and tell on each other,

report on each other, and that is making people very fearful of where they go and who they talk to and what they say. So it was a very, very changed place. But, you know, I wasn't there for as long as I had planned to be. Because what happened? Well, then the meeting that I had with the man who calls himself Abdul Kaha Balkhi, the spokesperson for the foreign ministry,

told me, he launched into me straight away. He told me that the security apparatus didn't recognise me as a journalist, that I make up my stories, that my sources don't exist. He asked me to provide all of the materials for a couple of stories that I'd written. You mentioned the one about the forced marriages, sex slavery and LGBTQI people. And I said that, you know, that with the sex slavery

story, everyone's on the record. You know, you do your job. I've done mine. He wanted to, what else did he want to do? He wanted to scare me, really. He reminded me of the way the Taliban had treated employees of a domestic television station in 2016 after the television station Tolo did report a falsehood about the Taliban and then refused for some reason to retract it. The Taliban for months issued threats and warnings and demanded the retraction. And when it didn't come, they sent a suicide bomber against a busload of employees of the station and killed more than half a dozen of them. So he reminded me that this is how we treat people who do false reporting about us. I said, you killed a lot of innocent people in that attack. He said, and we're proud

of that. I said, one of the people who was killed was a friend of mine. He said, and we're proud of that. I said, one of the people who was killed was a friend of mine. He said, and we're proud of that. So the message to me was very clear that I was facing the possibility of violence if I didn't retract. And he said that the security agency would ask me to leave the country. Because you were, I should say, you were filing stories, sharing information and gathering it as well to do your job, to get the word out about what you were finding. I didn't write anything. Yeah, sorry, I interrupted you Emma. I didn't write anything while I was there. I was in meetings and I was finding out what the situation was. And, you know, stories come to you when you're doing that, right? So I didn't go in with any preconceived ideas the security agency that calls itself the general directorate of intelligence caught up with me the next day they told me that they wanted to have a face-to-face urgent meeting

so they could talk to me in person about my crimes said look I'm going to go anyway I've been told you're going to ask me to leave I'm packing to leave can we do it on the phone he phone? He said, if you don't come and meet with us, I'm going to tell all the border points of the country not to let you out. Okay, come on over to my guest house. So they came over, he and three others and a gunman. And they were very rude. And they took me off to their headquarters. And they kept me there for four hours shouting at me asking me to justify myself they're not letting me speak um telling me that um in these words there are no gays in afghanistan then why do you call us extremists you know it's like well if you're going to say things like there's no gays in afghanistan i think that's a pretty extreme position to take you know and it

went on like this until they said to me we want you to say sorry so i said sorry they said that's not enough you have to you have to make it public and so they did i've got my notebook and my pen and they dictated to me what they wanted me to say so i wrote all that out and then they sent it to their boss who they tried to tell me was a woman you people don't believe we have any women working, that we don't let women work, but I can tell you that my boss is a woman. So a little while later, he puts the boss on speakerphone. It's a man, of course. The whole thing was just a farce. Then they sent the tweets, didn't like it, made me delete it, re-edited it and sent it again. So just can I break in at this point? So you did have to, in this situation you found yourself in,

publish tweets on your own account saying that stories you had written were what? Tell me the words, not accurate? That I'd made them up, that I don't know anything about Afghan culture, Afghan people. Three or four stories I wrote were premeditated attempts to undermine the authority of the Taliban. And I'm a bad person, essentially, that, you know, I'm a fantasist. And this was all quite clear to you that you had to send these tweets because you wouldn't be able to get out of the country safely if you didn't? They made it clear you either tweet an apology or you go to jail. And they stood around me as they said that. Generally, it was a convivial atmosphere, but they stood up and stood around me when they said, tweet or go to jail. And I know you're a very

experienced journalist, a very experienced journalist in this region as well in this area but but how did you feel at that point I'd be I'd be a liar if I said that I wasn't worried for my safety when they stood up there was a point at which one of the guys tried to take my phone off me they didn't take you know basically live text texted the whole experience with people who were on a WhatsApp group and had my location monitored. But I knew that this was a very unstable, unpredictable situation. There is no feeling amongst the people who I interacted with at this level of real authority.

They're very defensive about it. And really, that's what comes through with the abuse. You know, the foreign ministry spokesman was abusive, called me a white supremacist colonialist. I mean, that's just not the language that people in government and positions of assured authority use. So I knew that it was unpredictable and tenuous, but I also found in them a great immaturity and a desire to be respected. I said to them, you know, guys, hand on heart, in all sincerity, if you make me do this, you're going to look silly. So then they had a discussion

about the meaning of the word silly and decided that they wouldn't look silly. So they made me do it anyway. And I'll tell you what, they have looked sillier and sillier ever since. So anyway, at the end of it, I said, all over, can we go now? You'll take me back to my guest house. They said, yeah, we just have to record a confession, like a video confession. So what do you want me to say? So they moved the furniture and sat in front of me, this guy with his iPhone, video recording me making a confession

according to what they said. And the most important thing was that I say I wasn't coerced. So I put my headscarf around my neck and I held it up like a nose and laughed and said, and I haven't been coerced. And they all laughed. We better do that again we did it again and and then they took me back to my my guest house it was just kafka in its ridiculousness and it's fear and loathing tinged with um uh comedy but dark comedy and fear and they rule by fear. You know, I could get on, you know, I'm a feisty person, obviously.

I could get on a plane and leave. Afghan people can't do that. And over the course of the past year, they've utterly destroyed what media there was there and, you know, the lives of women, as you know, and as you mentioned. Yes. And we will go back to where we're going to actually have a bigger conversation about this to mark one year since the Taliban took power. Next month, I'll be speaking to a panel of women with a huge range of experience protecting women's rights in Afghanistan. So I hope our

listeners will be able to join me for that. It's actually going to be on the 15th of August. But as you say, the Taliban are in power. It's a very different atmosphere. You've actually been able to see it and feel it, albeit for a few days. Do you think you'll be able to go back there? Well, they let me leave of my own accord and they tweeted to that effect on day one. But by Friday, I had been sullied as a spy. I'd dressed up as a journalist to enter the country. They'd hunted me down. They'd found me in hiding. Just this fantasy. And then they

arrested and detained my driver and accused him of working for a spy. They beat him up. They deprived him of sleep for three days and they stole his car. So what they did by painting me after a couple of days as a spy was give themselves carte blanche and then treat everybody that I had contact with as an enemy of the people, of their whatever they call it, their caliphate. So, Emirate. And so, what I found was a very sinister and insidiously evil regime. So, would it actually be safe for you to go back? Well, you know, then they decided that I'm PNG. And why would I want to go back if I'm making

trouble for people that I'm in contact with? Their surveillance abilities are very sophisticated. I suppose that's the bigger picture for us as citizens trying to understand around the world what's going on in Afghanistan is we're not able then to have journalists, perhaps as you're saying here, go in and tell us those stories in a way that you had been doing for many years prior. Albeit, though, a response from the Taliban, from the foreign ministry that we have here for the programme, which says, of you, Ms O'Donnell was not asked to reveal her sources. But this statement goes on to say that you had failed to produce any proof which showed

you had not fabricated the reports that you'd filed that they were talking about. And this ministry spokesperson said the government continues to welcome journalists that adhere to the principles of journalism, including impartiality and integrity during reporting. That's from a Taliban foreign ministry spokesperson. What do you want to say to that? Well, the lies continue. But, you know, within a couple of days of me leaving Afghanistan, the spokesman for the government had reissued regulations for visiting foreign correspondents. Now, clearly there's going to be a spike up, again,

in interest in Afghanistan as we near the 15th, the anniversary of the fall of the republic and the Taliban's return, and they are preparing themselves. So they're tightening things up. They're making it very difficult for people to work freely and their treatment of me, calling me a spy, saying that I didn't provide proof when I told them all the names were on them, whatever. It's just their excuse for tightening the screws on people

who want to report the truth, whether they're Afghan nationals or foreigners who are going in there. So, yeah, Emma, you're right. The light's gone off. Lynne O'Donnell, as I say, I'm happy we could talk and you are able to be available to talk to us and talk freely. Thank you very much indeed. Thank you.

Thanks, Emma. And do join us for that. We will of course bring you any updates in the between with regard to Afghan women, Afghan girls or anything that is developing there. And of course our correspondent, our chief foreign correspondent Lisa Doucette also does a very good job of course across the BBC on that.

But on the 15th of August, I will be joined by that special panel of women who, some of whom, are hoping to get back to Afghanistan, to the country they miss and they love, but isn't the same as the one that they left. Now, many of you have been getting in touch while I've been having that conversation

about what you've been hearing, but also about the NHS in England facing, as it's put by a panel of MPs, cross-party MPs, its worst staffing crisis in history. A new report has come from the Commons Health and Social Care Select Committee. It found England is now short of 12,000 hospital doctors and more than 50,000 nurses and midwives. In a moment, I'll be talking to a GP about the impact on that part of the medical profession.

But we know that women make up 77% of NHS staff. But MPs in this report say, quote, talented women are missing out on the opportunity to become surgeons, for instance, because of a lack of support and role models. And we've also talked at length about different parts of the NHS. Only last week, I believe we had two women on who's doing a campaign around this and about sexism and a sort of anonymous website to try and help women in the NHS come forward.

We've talked about this before, but having this overview from these MPs is an important moment. Perhaps we shall see if there's any change. I should say we approached the Department of Health and Social Care to come on the programme this morning. We approached Downing Street,

but we have not yet had a response. Let me say from you, I have had a response before I introduced my first guest. There's a very powerful message here saying, I'm so sorry, I don't have the courage to give my name, but this is my 22nd year of working in the NHS as an allied health professional. During that time, I have seen tired, apathetic clinicians who have fallen out of love with what they do. And that was before the worst hit. I have tried consciously never to let that happen to me. It's now happening to me. Quality of care, standards of care are slipping. Crisis management has been normalised. Specialist services diluted, bullying r rife emotive language used with the intention of improving services to be these to be the best excuse me at what you do shouldn't be about doing too much of

it a counsellor told me when I run myself into the ground who knows what direction I'll take next the worst of it is that no one even notices or if they do it's too late of course there is a staffing crisis or to whomever found the energy to send that thank you very much indeed and i'm so sorry that's where you find yourself well listening to that and i'm sure with a response dame jane dacre a professor from ucl medical school she's the chair of the expert panel that reports into the health and social care committee good morning good morning that is a very powerful message actually to to start with it gives you a panel that reports into the Health and Social Care Committee. Good morning. Good morning. That is a very powerful message, actually, to start with. It gives you a frontline account,

really, doesn't it, of what's happening to morale, even with those who are seeing what's happening to others and don't want to let it affect them. Absolutely. That echoes very much what we've heard from a lot of the respondents to our expert panel review. We spoke in roundtables to 58 people. We had written evidence from 70 people and organisations. And that fed into the select committee report and it has to be said I know it's about NHS England but it does seem to have captured the imagination this morning do you think that's because there could be finally maybe because I don't know new prime minister coming because of the couple of years we've had with the pandemic do you think this could be a moment for change? I hope it is as As your correspondent who wrote in says, this problem has been a long time coming. People have been talking about the difficulties in the NHS

workforce for ages. We were pleased to be asked by the Health and Social Care Committee to do this expert panel report, which is essentially an evidence-based report on what is going on. And this just confirms people's fears. I hope that now is the time to start to do things. You know, if you use a medical model, when you have a diagnosis, you then go on to a management plan. The problem is we've had the diagnosis for a while. We haven't yet come up with an effective management plan

for the NHS and even more so for social care. The vacancies what do you what do you put that down to and there's a few messages coming in around this that are giving several reasons but as an overview how do you explain it and you know of course I'm especially interested in this because, you know, nearly 80 percent of the workforce are female. Yes. Well, if you ask the Department of Health and Health Education England, they say they've met their targets. But what became clear in our report is that there's no demand modelling in the development of those targets. So the targets are too low. So therefore they make the wrong target, for example. So not enough people are being recruited in, but even when people are recruited, not enough people apply, the posts aren't filled.

And then because of poor working conditions and also from the Health Select Committee's own report, problems with the pension cap on more senior doctors, people are leaving early. So not enough people are coming in, and too many people are leaving. So we have a half empty bucket. Right, because there was also just if I was to paraphrase a few messages. Let me go to this one, actually, because it does it it quite well there's a concern that the shortage of doctors is partly down to high incomes which enable part-time working who wouldn't given the job pressure lots also retiring due to a punitive tax trap we need to decide what we need the nhs to do not what we want it to do is that what you're seeing as well? It could be a contributor. However, I would

take issue with that view from the perspective of being a woman myself and of some other work that I've done in relation to women in the NHS. In a workforce that is 77% female, it's a no-brainer to treat those women well. You can't reach targets by whipping people harder. You have to reach targets with compassion and courtesy. So treating people better, having enough staff is the way to do it, in my view. So do you have faith? I mean, you might be forgiven in this country, certainly for not knowing who the health secretary is right now.

It's changed quite a lot. It is Steve Barclay. You might remember him from previous posts, such as the Brexit minister. But he is in charge, the man in charge. We had the women's health strategy only last week. Do you have faith in the fact that you've made these recommendations?

Because at the same time, you're also saying that those in charge of the NHS, and you only have to go and look at some of the recent question and answer sessions with those who are in charge of this, are meeting their targets. It seems to be quite entrenched, some of the problems. And if people can say, I'm meeting my target, they don't need to necessarily make any changes. Well, it's very difficult to continue to be optimistic about it, isn't it? And what's that quote that's attributed to Einstein? If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got.

In order to change tempo, we need to change the way that we manage the NHS. And I would suggest that investment in staffing of such a huge employer and also such a huge employer of women would be a very sensible thing to do. And again, it would save money. Yes. And just a final word from you, if I can, Dame Jane Dacre, is if you're listening to this and you don't work in the NHS, many of our listeners do, but if you aren't, many more of them are patients, How concerned should you be about the provision of healthcare? Well, the evidence that we collected suggested that rates of bullying and harassment of those providing healthcare, both from each other and from patients, is going up. So if I were a patient, I would be very worried because I think that that will mean the quality of care goes down. And if the quality of care goes down, patient satisfaction goes down. And unfortunately, patient safety

suffers. Thank you very much for talking to us. Let me bring into this Dr. Radhika Vohar, who's a GP and menopause specialist. Good morning. Good morning. And I always feel terrible taking GP's time. So I'm very happy that you've made a little bit of time for us this morning. And then there'll be those saying, I want to see and speak to my GP. You know, that's a gripe you will be familiar with. But this report this morning, what's your response to it from the position of being a GP and also, you know, being a female GP?

Thank you. I think it's a really worrying time. I'm nervous for it, but I'm glad that it's finally been documented how big the problem is. In my entire career since I qualified as a doctor, it's been looming that the NHS is struggling, but to have it articulated as the biggest crisis in history really puts to highlights how big an issue it is and big steps need to be taken and particularly for women at the moment we've got an era where we can change women's health and we need to because they are big contributors to society the welfare of children and the workforce and what's not we treat a woman well during her life cycle, it's really important. What's not happening for, I mean, 55% of GPs are women. That's the figure as of 2020, just to break it down to your specialism. What's not happening, do you think, for female GPs at the moment that you would like to see happening?

I think there's a huge professional and societal push to do everything incredibly well and to the full dedication it's a really hard training pathway with a huge amount of commitment from self-time in developing and qualifying and training as a GP and at the end of it we all have family duties that we're trying to juggle at the same time. So having a workplace that is flexible, like just mentioned, and lets you accommodate your family will always be investing in you so you can stay the other way.

Many women GP work part-time. And I think that's something that you have to do to be able to manage your life because we know the vast majority of family care falls on women's shoulders quite often. It's a huge juggle and I personally have experienced this. Sorry to break across, but I was going to say, isn't that one of the, can be, whether it's right or not, you tell me, a criticism that too many GPs, because the majority are now women, are working part time.

That there's a concern about people not seeing the same person enough and also about continuity of care and provision of service. What do you say to those who say it's an issue that we have so many part-time GPs? I think they're right. There is a point, it is an issue, but the wider issue is we have a huge social issue with childcare, wraparound care around school timings, the expense of childcare,

and the way our social setup is geared up towards managing family life. I mean, particularly during COVID, if we saw the flexible working model from working from home, working for some people, that added a new element of flexibility to be able to do that and survive and thrive in it. But from a self-care point of view, as a woman who's trained and worked in the NHS, it's an incredibly tough job to do full time and be able to look after your family adequately without the social support in place. Looking at the number of full-time GPs, it fell by more than 700 over the three years to March of this year, perhaps falling into and speaking to what you've just talked about. But I wonder, anecdotally, if you could give us a bit of a picture

of the GPs around you, women and men, what are the burnout situations like at the moment? Or what's the morale like? Because there's a lot of messages coming in about the actual atmosphere and the feeling in the part of the NHS that individuals work in. Oh, absolutely. And I think morale has so much to do with it. At the beginning of the

pandemic, we had a bit of positivity and appreciation going on. And that's changed now to being very negative, undermining, and there's some media stories that don't help the situation about how little GPs work in number of hours and how well paid they are. But actually, there's far more to it. And I think I would challenge anyone who tries to understand it until you've actually worked in it or visited it and seen the insides of working, there's far more to it. And I think I would challenge anyone who tries to understand it until you've actually worked in it or visited it and seen the insides of working. It's far more than just the hours that surgeries are open. There's a lot of work and it's relentless and demand has gone up. And as has expectation and work being passed over from hospital care. So we're seeing far more complicated aged patients that need more

complex care with a dwindling workforce. And it's very, very challenging. And I know as in your work also just as a menopause specialist, is there anything, I mean, are there some ironies that perhaps GPs going through the menopause are not then also in an environment that might be conducive as a workforce for that? Absolutely, there are. And I think that, you know, particularly as a woman, when you're going through your life stages, you learn a lot about how to look after your patients through your own experiences as a human being. So, you know, you need compassion, you need a workplace policy that understands that. And many women will change

their working hours because of menopause and one in five women will drop their job because of that so it's really important to have an understanding policy for that but also access to HRT from shortages point of view but clinicians and continuity of care makes such a difference in being able to seek help but I've definitely seen medical colleagues who have very much struggled to get menopause support. And sadly, it has resulted in some of them not continuing to work. Do you like being a GP? Do you want to keep doing it? How long do you think you've got? I think I will carry on doing it quite a while longer. I do love being a GP. I've been very

fortunate that I've done a variety of things such as women's health and contraception clinics and services to keep myself interested and upbeat. But I think for those people who are working four to five days in a general practice all the time doing the same consulting, it can get very, very draining and lead to burnout and mental health issues and I think that we need to acknowledge how much general practice has quickly adapted during Covid and taken on a whole new model of working and just continue to soldier on and show them some appreciation but also the Parliament and the Prime Minister need to deliver the impact that this report's going to

have and change things. Dr Radhika Vohar, thank you very much for your time. I'm going to let you get back to, I'm sure, a very busy day indeed, but I appreciate you taking those minutes out. Messages coming in. Leah for one says, I'm a midwife here. We've been shouting about this for years with little to no meaningful response from the government. Sadly, this report should come as no surprise. Another, I've been an NHS doctor for four years and it's absolutely facing a staffing crisis. In my last job, we were so short-staffed that I was asked to cover three doctor jobs

whilst heavily pregnant. It was only when I pointed out how unsafe this was that they eventually hired a locum. But occurrences were happening like this almost weekly and less forthright doctors were putting up with unsafe conditions. This was a top London hospital. Again, no name and you definitely don't need to leave your name. So please do keep getting in touch.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson has said, we do hugely value and appreciate the dedication and contribution of NHS and social care staff. We are growing the health and social care workforce with over 4,000 more doctors and 9,600 more nurses compared to last year and over 1,400 more doctors in general practice compared to March 2019. And so it goes. But we hope to get a minister on about this specifically, especially considering there are so many women affected in this. Now, the BBC will be broadcasting its first Green Sports Awards in October. It's designed

to highlight sportswomen and men who are helping to contribute to a more sustainable future. And ahead of the main event today, the winner of the Evergreen Award has been announced, and it goes to Leilani Munter, an American former professional stock car racing driver whose environmental activism has been central to her career. And I can speak to her now. Congratulations, Leilani. Thank you. Thank you for joining us today. Lovely to have you on. Before we begin on your activism, stock car race driving, could you just describe it for us?

Yes. So I started racing back in 2001 and stock car racing a little bit different than probably the cars you're familiar with, the open wheel cars like Formula One. I did run a little bit of open wheel, but mostly I've been in stock cars, which is a very popular sport out here in America. And most of you will think of NASCAR when you think of stock cars. Right. And you got into this because tell us a bit more about that. So I actually was earning a degree in biology, specializing in ecology, behavior, and evolution from the University of California in San Diego. And I had it on my bucket list of things to do to drive a race car because I kept getting in trouble for speeding. And so I went to racing school really just thinking I was going to drive that one day and check off that number on my bucket list and never drive a race car again

but I was the only woman at the track that day they were about 40 drivers and I was the fastest car and one of the instructors came over and encouraged me to pursue racing because partly because there were so few women in our sport and he he felt that that could give me um a little bit of an edge in in trying to find sponsors so what you're really saying is if you're getting a lot of speeding tickets consider a a new career in this field yes it was uh it was a tough conversation to have with my parents when i uh graduated with a degree in biology and i had to explain to them that i was moving to north carolina to drive race cars. You were the first race car team in history, I understand, to power your pit box using solar power. So let's, you know, the combination of your interests and your

studies coming through there, I suppose. Oh, sorry, you froze up. Oh, I apologize. Our line went down. I was just talking about the fact that you were the first race car team in history to power your pit box using solar power, which I imagine is, you know, your background coming through and your interests. electric car since 2013. And in 2014, we were able to get a mobile solar unit. So it's essentially a battery with solar panels attached, and we would take that to the racetrack and on pit road, which is where they change our tires and make adjustments to our race cars. And, you know, my crew chief is watching the race on television so he can see what's going on on the track all that power is typically coming from a diesel generator for most teams and we started using the solar power and the interesting thing that happened was uh other teams became interested in using solar not not for the carbon footprint not to go green but actually because they saw it as a competitive advantage because my pit area was so

much quieter, there wasn't this loud diesel generator running in the background, the crew had an easier time conversing with each other on pit road. So sometimes when you adapt to these more eco-friendly things, you actually find that you're gaining a function that you couldn't have with the old thing. It's not just replacing it, it's improving it. You've been doing, you know, this sort of stuff, trying to bring this attention to the environment for a long time now, you know, an early adopter, if you like, in a public way for trying to make the case for change. You won this award, congratulations. I know it's being awarded later in the year. But I suppose part of the reason these awards exist

is to try and shine a light on people who can have an influence. And sport can be so influential, can't it? It really is. And, you know, I really felt like I was using my race car as a way to bring together, you know, my environmentalism, all these things that I cared about, but I knew I had to bring it to the race fans at the racetrack. They're not going to show up at like the environmental film festival. They're not that interested in that sort of subject. But if I brought it to them there at

the racetrack, I would drive my electric car to and from all of the races. I would tell the race fans what superchargers I was going to be at. So if the race fans were interested in taking a closer look at my electric car, they could. And then I would put these issues on the car. I ran race cars that, you know, promoted solar power and clean energy. A couple of documentaries that I love, Blackfish and the Cove, about the captive cetacean industry. And then the last three years of my career, I was actually running a vegan themed race car. And we gave away 30,000 free vegan cheeseburgers to the race fans. And that allowed them to see that, you know, vegan food can be just as delicious

as the other stuff. And so my car kind of was like a 200 mile an hour billboard. But instead of advertising products that I wanted people to buy, I was trying to encourage shifts in their behavior. Leilani Munter, thank you very much for talking to us. Congratulations again. And I should say, if you know a sports organisation or an individual that's raising awareness or inspiring engagement around this or trying to reduce, I don't know, emissions, they can be nominated for one of these new awards, the Green Sports Awards.

And you can go and look that up at bbc.co.uk forward slash Green Sports Awards. Closing date for that and around there is the 31st of July. So very shortly indeed. Just quickly a message here from a retired NHS chief executive, originally a nurse and in the NHS for 50 years. After I retired, I was asked by a former colleague

how I felt and without thinking I replied, I no longer have to lie. What I was talking about was the fact that every day I had to introduce changes imposed by different political leaders, lacking understanding, lacking any thought for the consequences and the actual impact. Changes which were never evaluated and which were turned on their head with every change of government. I loved the NHS. I still believe in the idea of it. Politicians lay off. Thank you very much for that. Well, talking about politics put across the pond, it is now a month since the US Roe v. Wade ruling was overturned by the Supreme Court.

Eight states have already banned abortion and overall about half are expected to allow abortion bans or other limits on the procedure as this issue works its way through state courts. It's also been reported that anti-abortion campaigners in the UK and elsewhere have been emboldened by the Supreme Court decision and that women seeking terminations are seeing more protesters outside clinics. Well, in 2019, we asked the Women's Audience, you, our listeners, the questions, have you had an abortion? How did you feel about it then?

And how do you feel about it now? And a lot of you got in touch. Many of you had never spoken about what had happened before. And I should say this series was first broadcast in 2019. But in light of what happened in the US a month ago, we wanted to share some of those stories again. And I should say, because of the time difference, some of the terminology has changed, but the issues remain relevant.

Our reporter Henrietta Harrison in this particular story went to the home of a woman we're calling Louise and she had had an abortion 18 months previously. We had had an episode where the contraception had failed and I knew that I was ovulating that weekend or I was two weeks into my cycle so it was a Sunday evening so the Monday I spent the morning phoning around the pharmacies trying to get the morning after pill because the condom had split yes that's right nobody would give it to me over the counter they kept saying that I had to come in at a certain time to see the pharmacist and had to come after 2 30 and I had

to do the school run so it wasn't there was other pharmacies who didn't have it so in the end I phoned my GP and my GP gave me a prescription so I could go and get it from the local pharmacy without any of the fuss and I think it must have been a week later I started to feel unwell I slept for about three hours in the morning I woke up and I felt awful and I just said oh my god this can't be happening like I've got to be pregnant there's no other reason and I obviously Dr Google confirmed my worst fears that the morning after pill wasn't 100% effective so I did a test it was positive and um I think I just went into shock at that point, actually. I came downstairs and looked at my partner and he just knew that it was positive as well. And I think I just broke down into tears and I just said, I don't want to do this.

I can't do this. This is not what was supposed to happen. So you just immediately felt completely distraught? Yeah, there was no second thought in my head about what needed to happen. I fell accidentally pregnant with our third child, and he was only 10 months old at this point. I'd had a really bad struggle with postnatal depression after having him, and I had just been discharged from having the counselling and

I was just getting my life back on track and it literally was the worst possible time that I could have fallen pregnant. There was no other option. If I had those babies, my family wouldn't be happy, we wouldn't be in this house, I wouldn't be doing the job I'm doing. It's that kind of effect isn't it? Like you know one thing happens and it's just spirals and I knew that if I had continued that pregnancy then life for us as we knew it would have stopped. So what actually happened from finding out you were pregnant how did you then seek a termination? So I immediately phoned the GP that day that's how sure I was I spoke to the abortion network and I spoke to my GP but I was informed

that because I was hadn't missed a period and I was still not even four weeks pregnant they wouldn't be able to do anything until I was six weeks they had to be able to scan you to make sure there's a pregnancy so a bit a long wait a really long wait because I have a really bad morning sickness when I'm pregnant and I had to get through life for another two or three weeks whilst feeling rubbish and knowing that there wasn't going to be the outcome at the end of it. That you don't mind when you're continuing with the pregnancy. You don't mind the sickness. You don't mind those kinds of things. But when you know that that's, you know, it's all going to go at some point,

it's just a bit, I just wanted to feel better. You know, I was off over Christmas with the children and spent a lot of the time sleeping and feeling rather rubbish. How was your partner throughout all of this? Amazing. Yeah, really good. There was never, like, you must do this or you shouldn't do this. He just held my hand and just said, we'll get through it. Whatever happens, we'll get through it whatever happens we'll get through it how did the procedure take place you arrive and

then you're sort of sent to a waiting room where nobody talks to each other nobody looks at each other in the eye but what struck me the most actually while I was there is that it wasn't what I thought it would be like the people that in the waiting room were just like I was and there wasn't you know the typical teenage mum they could have been anybody you could have sat next to on the bus and you would never have known that they were sat there waiting for an abortion I think I waited for like 20 minutes and then they called you through and they just do a series of questions and they just ask when your last period was you know do you understand what's happening is it definitely what you want

to do they ask why you're doing it they ask about your family and I guess it's just that last check that but it was it was lovely because there was no judgment and she I think she even said to me at one point I would do exactly the same thing and it's just nice to have that reassurance that you're not I guess like hormones and hormones and, you know, just feeling overwhelmed with emotion. And you just, there's always that, am I doing the right thing? But it just kept coming back to my children deserve the best mum. They don't deserve a half mum who, you know, is really struggling, who's on antidepressants, who needs to go into hospital because she's having a bad episode

they needed really strong mum who could actually devote time to each of them another baby would have just meant that they got less time I got less time and yeah it wasn't really what I wanted for them so who took you there my partner yeah he drove me down there unfortunately we couldn't get anyone to have the children so he had the children in the back of the car so he just dropped me off and then took them to drive around for an hour we hoped that I obviously wouldn't be there a long time I think it said a couple of hours so they they were having a sleep I think we timed it just right that they were having a nap in the car so he could drive around with them for a bit and

then just waited outside. Take me back to being in the clinic so you got called and then and then what happened so I had that first interview and then they send you back into the waiting room and then you're called through into a scan room a bit like when you have your 12-week scan so having an internal scan was probably the lowest point I I think, of the whole time, because you're just like, I don't want to be here again. I don't want to have this. And I don't really want to be in this room doing this, but I'm doing it for the family. So I was having the scan and she said to me, I think it was either during or before,

do you want to know if it's a multiple pregnancy or not? And I kind of wasn't prepared for the question I hadn't even considered that it might be a multiple pregnancy I you know all I could think about was I was pregnant and I didn't want to be so I was just oh wow yeah okay um it doesn't really change my opinion but I guess it's interesting to know and um she was there for quite a long time, actually. I maybe was five weeks, four days or something. So I was super, super early. So she was struggling to see the sacks.

And then she sort of stopped and we finished. She was like, so I think you're pregnant with twins. And that I was not expecting. I cried at that point. I'm not sure why. Probably because it was another thing I had to think about. Although it didn't change my decision, it was suddenly, actually, if I did carry on,

that is even worse. I would have been in an even worse position than I would have been just with one baby. Twins would have meant I had four children under three. So in that moment, it was a harder but easier decision to make yeah yeah it felt real did it really real yeah and I guess that at that moment it was just a bit more clarity but sadness at the same time that had it been the third pregnancy or the second pregnancy it would have been totally different yeah it was a bit of a shock, to say the least. So eventually you went back, what, sort of 10 days later?

That was actually at the local hospital rather than a private clinic. That was a bit more daunting, actually. There were a lot more people in the waiting room and it was a lot more public. It was a sexual health clinic, so there were people there for all sorts of reasons, having counselling, having, you know, STD tests, abortions, getting their pill or their injection. So is that where you had the procedure? What actually happened? I had my partner with me that time. Someone had the children, so he was in the waiting room with me. They ask you one last time if it's definitely sure that it's what you want to do. Again, I said yes get I think they gave

you two options so you have to take an oral pill in front of them and then you can either take another set of oral pills or you can take them away and insert them internally that was what they recommended I think she gave me like five or six and wrapped them in tissue and just told me to go to the toilet and just pop them in like you would a tampon so I did that then I went back into the room and she just said to go home get a hot water bottle take some paracetamol go and rest go lay on the bed don't do anything um and she said you know you'll start to cramp you'll start to feel things um you'll bleed you may pass something you may see something you may not like everything is different for everybody.

But she's like, you'll know that it's happening because you'll have these really strong period cramps. And she just said, yeah, just to go home and rest. I was anticipating the worst, but just keen for it to kind of be over, really. Was there any doubt in your mind that you had made the wrong decision or the right decision, perhaps after the event? No, no, no. I never ever felt anything other than sheer relief that it was all over, to be honest.

I was done bearing children. I wanted to find my passion and my voice. And I didn't want to be just a stay-at-home mum with five children. That would have just been the worst possible situation I needed to have a reason and a job and I had to have something that I loved one of the reasons why I didn't want to continue with the pregnancy is that I had just began setting up my business in the December while I was off from my regular work I'd spent two weeks designing logos finding websites deciding on a business name and I just knew that that was where I wanted to focus my efforts and so the day I came out of hospital I actually went and did a photo shoot because I'd lined it up for somebody before this had all happened and I didn't want to let them

down and I didn't want to tell them why I couldn't do it so there was me with my large sanitary towel at somebody's house taking photos of their newborn baby that felt okay yeah no it was fine I think because I was so sure of my choice that it didn't I didn't feel anything and it was like this is why I'm this is why I've made the decision. I want to be here and I want to be photographing babies and families. I just got on with life. There were times where I found out that people were pregnant, so maybe like a couple of months afterwards,

that people had had their 12-week scans and they were announcing that they were pregnant. And I was like, oh, I would have been at this this point now but it did not make me want to think oh I wish I'd gone through with my baby like just no not there do you feel ashamed no I'm not ashamed of it I do worry about who I talk to about it I do worry about upsetting people I know there are people that maybe can't have a baby or maybe have lost babies or even people that their religious beliefs or you know they just don't think that's the thing to do so I am cautious about who I tell but not because I'm embarrassed but more because I don't want to upset people or make them feel uncomfortable in front of me.

I will talk to anybody about it. If they were to ask me about it, I'll quite openly say it. I'm just cautious about whether or not I'm the one who brings it up first. And do you have any sense that you ended a life, or in your case, two lives? Do you feel that at all? No. In my eyes, it was a cluster. There was just some cells, and they were never going There was just some cells and they were never going to be a baby because they were never meant to be a baby. They were an accident. I'd taken the morning

after pill. I think maybe it had been different if I hadn't realised, but I knew from the minute that we realised there was an issue, I didn't want to have a baby so I don't feel like I ended a life. They wouldn't have had a very good mum. They wouldn't have had what I would want for my children. My mental health would have deteriorated and I would have ended up I think either on long-term antidepressants or even as far as say that I would have ended up in psychiatric hospital. So the pro-life lobby would say that you ended a life. Yeah. How do you respond to that?

They can't say what I did was wrong because they weren't me and they've never walked a day in my life. They've never been in my shoes. They don't know what it felt like to realise that you're pregnant when you don't want to be pregnant. I mean, I can't imagine what it felt like to to realize that you're pregnant when you're not you don't want to be pregnant I mean I can't imagine what it's like for anybody who's not in a loving relationship to go through that because that was hard enough and I had someone there the whole way I had my partner I had his mum I had my mum I had my sister I had everybody there for me I had so many friends that were behind me imagine doing that on your own I don't think anybody has the right to say that what you've done is wrong or wicked.

You've said that you were certain that you made the right choice at the time. Do you think in the future that might change? No. We are very clear that we don't want any more children. Within about a month of me having an abortion, my partner was booked in to have a vasectomy our family is very complete and we are very happy we have three very lovely wonderful children I don't think that we'll ever think that we made the wrong decision for a list of organizations

offering support do look at bbc's action line website at bbc.co.uk forward slash action line next time in this series, this mini series, a woman explains why she feels her abortion more than 40 years ago negatively shaped her whole life. Thanks for your company. I should say today, but tomorrow at 10. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Thank you so much for your time.

Join us again for the next one. Tell me this. Would you like to be a princess? There was always talk about oh my god Prince Harry was in Mahiki last night, how exciting and then we'd all go to Mahiki the next night because Prince Harry was there. Would it be liberating? You couldn't believe the ferociousness with which she just fought restlessly for inequality and always championed the underdog. Glamorous. They all knew that Victoria Davis was a very special little girl. At the end of term, this royal coach would rock up at the school and take her away to wherever the royal family was staying.

Or perhaps just a bit sad. She was not cast in a Vogue photo shoot because the people running the shoot decided that she was too large and she wasn't slim enough. I'm Anita Arnott and for my new podcast on BBC Radio 4 I'll be exploring the complicated idea of the princess. I'll be sitting down with actors like Meera Sial, authors like Kate Moss and TV presenters and comedians like Toph and Russell Kane to get their favourite princesses, historical or fictional. So, from Princess Leia and Grace Kelly to Mongolian wrestler Kutulun and the little girl Queen Victoria fondly called her African princess,

do join me, Anita Arnand, for Princess on BBC Radio 4. Subscribe 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.