Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: Forced adoptions, Author Paula Byrne, Is rugby safe?, Stalking and heart disease, Wool Sourcing

Episode Date: September 1, 2025

The former Prime Minister Gordon Brown has added his voice to calls for an apology for what he has called the state's role in the "terrible tragedy" of historic forced adoptions. Between 1949 and 1976, thousands of pregnant women and girls in the UK were sent away to "prison-like" homes run by the church and state and had their babies put up for adoption. In 2021, an inquiry concluded that the State bore ultimate responsibility for the suffering inflicted on vulnerable women and their children, calling on the government to issue an official apology. Anna Foster was joined by Diana Defries, chair of the Movement for Adoption Apology and Karen Constantine, author of Taken, experiences of forced adoption, to give their reaction to the intervention by the former PM and whether they will be granted an apology.Paula Byrne, Jane Austen’s biographer and also a novelist, has spent 25 years researching and writing about the iconic author. In this 250th anniversary year of Austen's birth, she joined Kylie Pentelow to talk about her new novel, Six Weeks by the Sea, which is her first fictional treatment of Austen and tells the story of how she imagines the most famous romance writer of all time first fell in love.If you’ve been watching any of the Women’s Rugby World Cup you may have seen ‘high tech mouthguards being used. They will now flash red — signally potentially high impacts, requiring players to have a head injury assessment - a move aimed at improving player safety. So just how safe is it for women to play rugby? What are the risks of getting injured, and what is being done to mitigate those risks? We hear from Fi Tomas, women’s sports reporter at the Telegraph, Dr Izzy Moore, reader in human movement and sports medicine at Cardiff Metropolitan University and Welsh Ruby Union injury surveillance project lead, and Dr Anna Stodter, senior lecturer in sport coaching at Leeds Beckett University, former Sottish International player, who also coaches the university team.After learning about the threat to harvest mice in the UK, 13 year old friends Eva and Emily decided to breed 250 of them at home and release them into a local nature reserve - with the help of a crowdfunder and Chris Packham. Women who've been stalked, or had to take out a restraining order, have a much higher chance of suffering a heart attack or stroke, according to a new study from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. It followed a group of over 66,000 women across 10 years, and found those who'd been stalked were 41% more likely to develop cardiovascular disease, with those who'd taken out a restraining orders 71% more likely to have heart problems. Kylie talked to Dr Audrey Murchland, one of the lead researchers who carried out the study, about their findings.Justine Lee is a knitwear designer of 30 years who fell out of love with fast fashion. Her latest work focuses on helping to protect the future of British rare breed sheep. She works with shepherds and wool producers, mostly women, and has knitted swatches from all 62 rare-breed sheep to show the versatility of the wool. She joined Anita Rani to discuss her work with farmers, her knitwear designs and her new book which showcases the wool.Presenter: Kylie Pentelow Producer: Annette Wells Editor: Corinna Jones

BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. Hello, this is Kylie Pentelow and you're listening to The Woman's Hour podcast. Hello and welcome to the programme. Coming up some highlights from this week, as the women's rugby world cup gets into full flow, we'll find out about safety in the sport and whether a flashing mouth guard could help concussion rates. Also, the woman who knows everything you possibly can about Jane Austen, Paula Byrne. Her new book is all about the only love affair that Jane Austen is rumoured to have had. Plus, knitwear designer Justine Lee, on her new coffee table book,

celebrating British sheep and all things woolly. How being stalked can increase your risk of having a stroke or heart attack. And what have you achieved in your summer holidays? Well, 13-year-old best friends, Eva and Emily, have single-handedly released 250 under-threat harvest mice, saying it's a much better use of their time than sitting on social media, a bit of inspiration for you coming up. Lots to get into, so let's get started. Now Monday marks the 1st of September, and with it, Parliament will resume. One issue the former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown is hoping will be on Sakea Stama's entry, is issuing an

apology for what he's called the state's role in the terrible tragedy of historic fourth adoptions. Now, between 1949 and 1976, thousands of pregnant women and girls in the UK were sent away to prison-like homes run by the church and state and had their babies put up for adoption. In 2021, an inquiry by the Joint Committee of Human Rights concluded that the state bore ultimate responsibility for the suffering inflicted on vulnerable women and their children, calling on the government to issue an official apology. Well, earlier this week, Gordon Brown added his voice to this campaign, saying that the apology should be made in this parliamentary term.

Anna Foster was joined by two women who've been campaigning for this for years and have experience of it, Diana DeFries, chair of the Movement for Adoption, and Karen Constantine, author of Taken, experiences of forced adoption. And she began by asking Karen what her reaction was, to Gordon Brown getting involved with the campaign. I think when Gordon Brown speaks, then people certainly listen. And when you take a close listen to what he said in that interview,

he has already said that he's been in touch with the Department for Education and he's anticipating an apology early in the new term in Parliament. So I really hope so because the burden of shame and the trauma and the secrecy that women have experienced, some now in their 70s and 80s, frankly, they are, you know, taking that to the grave with them. And this apology is urgent. And I should say that when I started to do the research for the book about three years ago and I interviewed more than 40 people, all people wanted, whether they were mothers that had had their babies taken from them, whether they were other family members, fathers, for instance, or whether they were the people that were taken, the adult adoptees, they all just wanted the apology. It is vital now that the government step up and give this apology

and we would like them to do that in concert with us. We would like to have a discussion with them because to date we haven't been able to do that. You're right. It's a powerful thing to receive an apology for anything, isn't it? How do you feel, Diana? Do you feel that this is moving things forward? As Karen said, I sincerely hope so.

We've had prominent people speak on our behalf before. and we've had hopes then, and we have hopes now. We just have to wait and see. We have no idea what will happen and how this will unfold, but we want to be cautiously hopeful. Would you, Diana, as well, just remind us, because of course regular listeners to the programme know that this has happened in Ireland.

It's something we've covered a lot on the programme, but people might be surprised to know that this took place in the UK as well. Tell us more about what happened. it's a long sad story of exploitation really when a young woman found herself pregnant and again it was always the women who were punished or vilified it was very seldom attention very seldom went to the fathers of these children

there was a sense that she'd transgressed the social norms. She brought shame on the family and she would be sent to either a mother and baby home or somewhere similar, hidden away, left to deal with her pregnancy on her own. Often there was no antinatal care and the process of bringing that child into the world would also be extremely traumatic because the attitudes of those people who were around during delivery were often extremely harsh. It varied from woman to woman, home to home situation to situation, but ultimately it was very, very difficult. And even when arguing one's case as a young mother, no one listened, no one gave options about what you might be able to do to keep your baby. It was always a matter of

you'll do the best thing, you'll give this baby to a proper family. And the way that was put was if you love your baby, you'll surrender it for adoption, you'll do the right thing, you'll do the best thing. It was one of the cruelest things that could have been done to a young mother. Karen, what happened to you? Well, I just wanted to add to what Diana had said. I mean, it was cruel. And I think the point here is it was profit-making.

So that when I went into a modern baby home, my parents were asked to make a contribution. because they were poor, they were allowed the discounted rate of 20 pounds per week, which is now about 140 something. So that's a vital thing to understanding this. This wasn't just about the shaming of women and girls, but it was also about making money. And many of the churches had robust networks into which we were all fed. So I went into a mother and baby home in 1978, which is obviously beyond 1976. And in that, I was taken away from, as all the women were, completely cut off from your family, your education, you work in some cases, you were completely isolated. I certainly

felt like a prison. I was a very young, 15-year-old. And, you know, I didn't have the assertiveness then that I have now. So I didn't ask if I could go outside. I just remained inside. I was essentially shamed and judged and then indoctrinated repeatedly on a daily basis by a man that was the priest and also my social worker to hand over my baby. And in the end, I didn't, for whatever reason. But when I came out of that home, I was then part of, you know, a society that continued to judge me and my child and the second child that I had. I had another child very quickly because I wanted to be a family, you know, because I'd been told a family was a good thing to be. And I lived, Basically, we lived in poverty, in squalor, in a community that scorned us.

You know, we became the reason why other mothers might look at a young woman that was pregnant and say, you don't want to end up like her. So I was, you know, cut off from most of my family. That's a pattern that persists. I'm sure this is in common with other women. And when I found out the scale, when I found out it was 215,000 women that had been subject to this, rather than just me. in a sort of isolated bubble.

When I later came to realize it's probably in the region of half a million women that have been put through this process, that's what stimulated me to write the book because I couldn't believe that all of that lived experience and all of the politics of the situation wasn't captured somewhere. And the point is now we have made a fuss with the government.

We have written to the ministers repeatedly. We have laid it out as simply as it can be laid out. And it is now time for this apology. for reparations to follow. Yeah, and as you explain there so powerfully, it's not just something that affects those years when it's happening. It's something that continues to affect you for the rest of your life. And Diana, in your case, you had your daughter taken away from you.

Yes, when she was 12 days old, I was taken from the South Coast where I'd been sent. And I didn't want to let her go. So she was literally, torn is too strong a word, but she was taken very, with a great deliver intent from my arms. And we were separated. And in that moment, and the doctor, he loses everything. And a mother is utterly bereft. I think the point I'd also like to make is that

because there's very little or no antinatal care, very little or no postnatal care, and there's no acknowledgement, it becomes a secret. Because nobody ever says, congratulations on your baby. Nobody ever acknowledges what you've been through. So you live with this really profound experience. It's a right of passage. Having your first child is a right of passage and it's sullied by this and you're damaged by this and so many women, whether in Karen's situation or in my own or, you know, each situation is unique. But we all carry the trauma of having a child

taken or having been through a mother and baby home and being treated as if we're the lowest of the low and nobody acknowledges it. So what we need in this apology is an acknowledgement of the huge injustice that's been done, the damage that's been done, the terrible things that people have had to live with in secrecy because nobody wants to listen. And now it's time. It's time that people listen. It's time the people acknowledge it. And what Karen was saying about it being a money-making machine, absolutely. Nothing proliferates without profit. And that big machine that was operating, that was enabled by the state. So we expect something from this government. We hope for something from this government to acknowledge all the injustices, to acknowledge all the cruelties,

and to acknowledge the machinery that was in place, that was empowered by the governments of the time. Yeah. A spokesperson for the current government has said this abhorrent practice should never have taken place and our deepest sympathies are with all those affected. We take this issue extremely seriously and continue to engage with those affected to provide support. What it doesn't do is give what you want, which is an apology or a date for it. I wonder, in the case of both of you, actually, what impact this had on your children? Because, Diana, you did reconnect with your daughter? I did. We were two of the more fortunate people in situations like this. We managed to reconnect just after her 18th birthday. And we had a lot of time to sort of begin that relationship. But those

relationships are never quite what you would expect them to be. They're never as they would have been. Nothing quite fits in the way it was. Karen, you kept your son, as you said, but you also had a second son as well, as you were describing. I do you, as they're growing up, how do you describe that to them? How do you, because eventually they come to know you and the work that you do as they've grown up. How has it changed their lives? Well, to be honest, you know, I wish that that was the case, really. the pattern that was laid down in my family regarding my behaviour at 15 and my

proclivity for getting pregnant and the punishment that I received is a pattern that's being repeated. I'm still estranged from my family and unfortunately for me that has extended to my oldest son and my younger son unfortunately died in 2001. So I don't have the opportunity to explain to them, to even say, look, I'm sorry, I did my best. We had a lot of love. We had a lot of good times, actually. But it's very difficult to, we didn't, they weren't brought up in a way that I, that I later brought up my second two daughters. So by the time I had my second two daughters, I was established, I had a career, had money. They had a completely different lifestyle. They didn't grow up in a cold, dingy house, you know, it was much better. I think the impact

on me was that I was constantly striving to prove myself. And so I think I probably had PTSD and I probably was never the relaxed mother that I wanted to be. So I think it has long-term impact. Karen Constantine and Diana DeFries there. Next, Paula Byrne. She's Jane Austen's biographer and also a novelist who's spent 25 years researching and writing about the iconic author. Six weeks by the sea is her first fictional treatment of Austin, after three acclaimed non-fiction books, including 2013's, The Real Jane Austen, A Life in Small Things. This year is the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen's birth, and Paula's book tells the story of how she imagines the most famous romance writer of all time first fell in love. Well, Paula joined me this week, and I began by asking her,

what made her want to recreate this love affair when we're not really sure it even took place? Do you know, there's one question that keeps coming up in my 25 years of thinking, writing, lecturing, talking about Jane Austen. The audience always say, did she fall in love? And I've dismissed that over the years. I've just thought, oh, here we go again. Boring, she was in love with her work. We don't need to go down there. But I started to rethink it because somebody said, how could she have written it?

this was Virginia Woolf. How could she have written persuasion? How could, and other people have said the same, if she didn't know what it was like to fall in love? So I went back to Cassandra's story about the seaside romance, well documented by the family. So it did happen. We just don't know much about it. So the impulse was that question. Did she herself fall in love? So how would you say you've written Jane and what parts of her personality did you want to bring out through this book. Well, her playfulness, obviously, and her wit. And again, quoting Wolf, she said, who has a temerity to write about Jane Austen? I took on that challenge. I wanted to present her as sort of naughty little sister. She's saying outrageous things to make Cassandra laugh.

That's her place in the family dynamics. So she's irreverent. If you read the letters, she is so mischievous. She's so naughty. She makes terribly bad taste jokes. So I want to use 25 in my novel. And I just wanted to bring out this irreverent, feisty, formidable, playful, funny, witty person. And it was a huge challenge. It's interesting you use the word feisty there. That's something that Helen Mirren said she didn't like to be used. But I think that's quite appropriate here for Jane. Because she is, yeah, she's interesting, isn't she? She's quite probably not what I would have expected from her in this novel. And I really like her. Oh, I'm so pleased.

You know, this is the woman who makes, you know, one of the most terrible jokes about miscarriage ever. I wanted that, Jane. I didn't want this Victorian spinster. I wanted this Georgian as a playful, irreverent. She is very much a product of her time, but she's very much the product of being part of a big family. So that's, I had that in mind the whole time.

And what is it like when you're number six? You're making everyone laugh. You're vying for your place in that family. You've got to be funny or you won't get her. Tell us about Samuel Rose, who is the focus of Jane's attention. Well, who is this mystery man? So Cassandra, the sister, talking about this romance years later, described him as extremely handsome, amiable.

She's describing him in comparison to someone else, but it's too complicated. And she said he was the only man worthy of my sister's love. So I was thinking, well, what kind of man would be worthy of this woman, this incredible woman's love? So to me, I found this real life character, Samuel Rose. it's not him, but he was an abolitionist, he was a lawyer, he was a poet, he was an editor, he was a friend of William Cooper who happened to be Jane Austen's favourite poet,

and I was like, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, handsome, all of that. So it was an easy task in some ways to get inside him because I knew quite a bit about him, but it's not him, but I thought that is the kind, and she was obviously, and as an abolitionist herself, I think she would have been drawn to somebody who really cared about the abolitionist movement, so he was just my perfect fit. Shall we hear a bit of the novel then? This is where you describe Samuel seeing Jane on her way home. Mr Rose fixed his eyes on a green parasol heading up the beach, advancing briskly.

Miss Jane had been dipped early that Thursday morning and was returning for her warming dish of chocolate. She was without her veil, and as she approached, he observed her quick and bright eyes and the way she had of turning them swiftly on an object and holding them there. Her eyebrows, like musical slurs, were a shade darker than her her. Her face was utterly captivating with a frankness of expression he had not seen before in a woman. And that, the utterly, the frankness of expression is something that was said about Jane Austen and her eyes. And I'm also tapping into Elizabeth Bennett there because of the big dark eyes.

So it was just that he glances at earlier on, but I just like this eye. idea of this parasol coming up and she's walking briskly and we know Jane Austen was a walker and a brisk walker. So it's just these little things, little moments I wanted just to bring alive because we know so little about her really, which is great because it gets me licensed to make it up, you know. And it's called Six Weeks by the Sea. Was it important then for you to base it by the sea and why? And Six Weeks by the Sea is a quotation from Sanderton, her seaside novel that she was writing around about the time, well, she was dying actually. So I had this idea, and we know that Cassandra said she fell in love in 1801, in the summer of 1801.

Where was she there? And she was in Sidmuth. And I love Sidmuth. And I've written about Sidmuth in my previous Jane Austen book because her great love was the sea. She did love being dipped. Now, in those days, women didn't swim. They were dipped in by a dipper. Yeah, explain that.

When I first read that, I was like, what is this? So what would happen is on one half of the beach, the men, they could swim naked, do their thing. And at the other end of the beach, women would go. go into the sea in a different time. They'd go into a bathing hut. They would disrobe, put on a muslin gown, be rolled down to the water's edge, and then a burly dipper. They were called dippers. Barely women would dip women three times into the sea. And Jane Austen writes about this in her letters. And she says, oh, I was dipped. I loved her so much. I stayed and I think I've caught a cold. So I just love this image of the freedom. And I was thinking a little bit of

Kate Chopin's The Awakening, which is a marvellous novel, feminist novel about how women are liberated by swimming. So I had this idea we know she loved being dipped in the sea. So I just had this a lovely image of his seas are being dipped and she's a bit embarrassed and she's not wearing her best gown and she was as sandy. So I just really wanted to bring her life the importance of the seaside. She was writing the great seaside novel.

Persuasion, of course, Lyme Regis is a huge part. People were flocking from Bath and all these, the towns. They were coming to the seaside. Better roads. We can get to the seaside. All of a sudden. novels are beginning to be set by the seaside and you get rogues, you get all sorts of characters. So for me it was easy. I just love the sea. I was brought up by the sea. And Sidmouth was just the perfect location.

You're not only an Austin biographer. There's lots of other things. You're a novelist, of course, as well. Teacher, family counsellor listed as well. So where did this passion? Because you clearly are very passionate about Jane Austen. Where did it come from? Well, do you know, I fell in love when I was 14. My teacher at school didn't like me. He didn't allow me to sit for my GCSE English literature at O level in those days. So I took myself off to night school at 14 because I knew he was wrong. And the teacher there was inspiration.

He was teaching Mansfield Park. And I opened that first page. And I fell in love with Jane Austen. And I just pledged that I would dedicate my life. And that woman has taken me all right for the while. She's been just a source of utter joy in my life. That's fantastic. And of course, 250 years since her birth this year.

I guess this is the biggest year for a Jane Austen biographer, is it? We're all writing our books. We're all getting them out. And I just thought, oh, look, I'll have fun with this. It's not a deep book. It's just six weeks. And it was the only time to do it. And it's wonderful.

We're seeing all these fantastic programs about Jane Austen. We still love her. We're still thinking about her. We're still writing about her. There's more adaptations. We're never going to get enough of her. We can't get enough of her. When I was reading it, I feel like I was reading a Jane Austen.

Is that what you wanted? Yes. Actually, Kylie. No, that's exactly because I really wanted to get inside and the rhythms of her speech and the jokes. So a lot, some of the jokes I made up, but a lot of them are her own jokes because she's so funny. And I thought, how can you create this person

who is the funniest person in the English language, as far as I'm concerned, second to none. And how do I do that? How do I make her witty? Well, it's quite easy because we've got the letters and also we've got the novels. That was Paula Byrne there, and six weeks by the sea is out now. Next, there have been record wins and record attendances for the women's rugby world cup. As hopes by many, the attendance record was broken on the opening night as 42,723 people watched England beat the US. USA in Sunderland. Also big wins for hosts England, Ireland and Scotland and some battling

performances from underdogs like Brazil and Spain. On Friday, Women's Hour came live from Bladen Rugby Club Gateshead ahead of the first game of the Women's Rugby World Cup that night and it was a great listen. So if that programme inspired you to take an interest in the game and you've been watching some of the matches, you may have noticed players wearing high-tech mouthguards, they'll now flash red, signaling potentially high impacts requiring players to have head injury assessment. Now, it's a move aimed at improving player safety. So just how safe is it for women to play rugby? What are the risks of getting injured? And what's being done to mitigate those risks? Nula was joined by Fiona Tomas, women's sports reporter at the Telegraph. Dr. Izzy Moore,

Reader in Human Movement and Sports Medicine at Cardiff Metropolitan University and Welsh Rugby Union Injury Surveillance Project Lead. And also by Dr Anna Stoddter, Senior Lecturer in Sport Coaching at Leeds Beckett University, former Scottish international player who also coaches the university team. Anula began by asking Fiona, is the game safe for women? The short answer is yes, I do. I think, you know, rugby is very synonymous, obviously, with head injuries. and concussion, mostly due to the class action lawsuit, which is sort of overshadowing the sport

at the moment. And for listeners who might not be familiar with that, it's effectively a class action lawsuit brought by hundreds of former rugby league and rugby union players, mostly men, it must be said, who played predominantly during the amateur era, who were attempting to sue the sports governing bodies over negligence due to brain injuries linked to repeated concussions at they sustained, sadly, during their careers and they alleged that the authorities did not do enough, frankly, to protect them from repeated head injuries. I must also say that a handful of women are part of that lawsuit. It's currently stuck in the high court and we don't yet know whether it will kind of progress to a full trial. But yeah, I think with any context for that there is

an element of risk, right? There is an element of, you know, head injuries like we see in the same way in football and even netball sometimes. So I think it largely is safe. Yeah, well, let's get into some of the specific injuries. Izzy, as you are, a specialist in human movement and sports medicine. What about women's rugby and what they endure? It's around about 1.5 injuries per match occur in women's rugby. And if we compare that across to the men's side,

the men's side have between three or four injuries per match. I should carry out that with that number may potentially increase as the game becomes more professional, becomes better resourced. We have people with the skills and knowledge to be able to monitor the players more closely and record the data. So we have to remember that data may not be as accurate as we quite want it to be just yet. And we do, as Fiona mentioned, concussion. Still one of the priority injuries, even in the women's game.

And it is looking like the rate of concussion. is actually becoming on par with the rate that we are actually seeing in the men's sport. That's only been shown in the English Premier League data. What that means is that concussions are actually making a slightly bigger proportion of the injuries that we see in the women's game compared to the men's. So let's talk about concussion specifically. I mentioned mouthguards at the beginning, these flashing mouthguards. Some people have called them, you know, a goal toward safety.

Other people calling them a gimmick. How do you understand them, Izzy? How do they work? So these mouthguards are essentially detecting how quickly the head is moving. That's what we're using that to measure. And the quicker that is moving or the accelerations or deceleration's being exposed to, we can put in a threshold, if you will. And if it goes above that threshold, then we can say, well, maybe there is a risk here that that's been a high impact event.

And let's pull them off to have a love. at whether a concussion has occurred. Now, we don't have the evidence to be able to say this is a clear threshold, and if it goes above that, then it definitely is a concussion. There are so many other factors that come into play. And in particular, in the women's game, there's evidence out there that shows that the women can actually experiment these acceleration events, not just from direct contact with the head-on-head contact

that we see in the men's rugby more frequently, hence the law to try and lower that tackle height. They have like a whiplash effect as well. So a more uncontrolled movement of that head and that can come from being tackled. It can come from the fall, hence why a lot of them work. I know Anna has been involved in terms of coaching.

The technique is really important, not just in how they engage, but also how they fall. Because in women's rugby, we also see high acceleration events from whiplash and body to ground in that falling as well. Yeah, and I hadn't really thought about it until I was preparing to speak to you three women

about women's necks. And let me bring in Anna here, Anna Stoddter. Men's necks, thicker, stronger at times. Talk us through a little bit about how injury perhaps can be more prevalent for women depending on some of our physiology. So my role is to do with coach learning and actually I work more with coaches to think less about the kind of physiology or the biological differences and more about how we can change the environment for women and the support around them to help them tackle more safely and more effectively. So things like the physical differences, they might be slow to change but the systems around them like having coaches who are well informed about the mechanisms of injury and the ways to work around that is something.

that we can change and that's what I'm trying to do. Yeah, so let's talk about that because we hear about the acceleration, about whiplash, for example, just coming back to the neck. What can you teach to try to prevent injuries like that? So once I learned about these kind of injury mechanisms from the research, I began to see it in my own coaching practice. So I teamed up with Dr. Katrina McDonald, who's a colleague from judo. And we started to see if we could use some of the principles.

suppose of falling and landing from judo to inform coaching and rugby. So in judo and some other martial arts, learning to fall and land effectively is the first thing that you learn to do. And so we tried that with our players. And then we worked with World Rugby and the high performance women and coaching group to create contact confident, which is fully available on the World Rugby website. And it's a set of video activities that coaches can use to better prepare their players for tackling and being tackled. So coming to another, part of the body. And let me come back to you, Izzy, on this. Breast injuries and breast pain have been highlighted as issues. And even when I was looking at, you know, some of the latest

scores this morning, the pictures that are shown of women, you know, diving over that line. And of course, breasts are going to hit first. Talk me through a little bit of what people need to be aware of and what's happening. Yes. So breast health is one of the key areas when we think of female health broadly. And unfortunately, we don't really have the systems in place currently that will even record breast injuries or breast pain. So we have a system that is built on have you missed training or have you been unavailable to play? And most women, what we see in the research is about half the women have experienced breast injuries when they play contact sports and indeed exercise-related breast pain. But they will keep going and they often

perhaps the majority of the time do not report it either because maybe they didn't know that they should report it, no one asked them. And when we look at actually even how we record our information, there isn't even a breast category in our surveillance system. So it falls under the chest. So even if you did, that data would almost be hidden within chest injuries. And further to this, before 2020, there wasn't even a breast injury diagnosis in the normal. systems that we use. One was introduced in 2020 and we've got a paper that hopefully

is going to come out this year or early next year there has more codes and more diagnoses for the breast, for the pelvic health and for pregnancy and postpartum rugby players as well. But I'm wondering, or I was wondering, as I looked at this, you know, boxing, so many women that are really coming to the four in that particular sport as well

and that they obviously have rules around. But I was trying to think like for women playing rugby and their breasts, what can be? Like, is there any sort of shield? I know that might sound crazy, but, you know, is there something that can protect them? So for exercise-induced breast pain, which a lot of, not just rugby, but others,

having an appropriately fitted and supportive sports bar, that really helps minimise the breast motion, and that's the key thing for exercise breast pain. For the breast injuries, their breast protection is really in its infancy. That's what I was wondering. We don't have, to my knowledge, any studies which have got breast protection which falls under the rules of regulations of rugby that have been shown to be effective. And that's because, A, we don't have the data. So we don't know what breast injuries are before, let alone when they then wear it.

And most players aren't aware of any, and there isn't really something that I think is discussed. and we need more resource and funding in that area to really explore the breast health. Let me come back to you, Fiona, on this. Is there more that governing bodies for rugby need to be doing to make the game safer for women? I think just how easy touched upon there, we historically have used annual injury reports from the men's game

and literally just transferred them, copy and pasted them into the women's game. And we really need to start maybe acknowledging that there are specific. gender considerations for female players, such as breast pain, breast injuries, stress urinary incontinence, which I know is he's done a lot of work on as well, whereby women are literally getting tackled that intra-adominal pressure on what could be their dysfunctional pelvic floor is causing them to leak urine on the pitch, which can be hugely embarrassing. And like we've

already mentioned, these issues, these injuries are not currently considered time-lossed injuries. So, you know, that's why they aren't being talked about. They aren't being reported as much by women. They aren't being logged. I think first and foremost, that awareness piece still needs to be worked on and flagged by Rugby's authorities. I know World Rugby are, I think, funding some ongoing research into breast health and breast injuries at the moment.

And that's why you probably didn't see a lot of women over the weekend slide over the whitewash, like you say, because we can't just copy what the men do because your boobs are going to take a hit. That was Fiona Tomas, Dr Izzy Moore and Dr Anna Stoddter there. In a statement from World Rugby, they say player welfare is at the heart of everything we do in rugby. Whilst there is a risk of injury as with any sport, there's solid evidence to show that the huge benefits of playing rugby from fitness to mental health outweigh any risks. They go on to say in partnership with world-leading experts, World Rugby produces free of charge resources aimed specifically at

female players, including strength and conditioning programs, tackle technique training and guides on topics including pelvic, breast and menstrual health. And on the legal case, they say, whilst we cannot comment directly on the ongoing legal action, we would want anyone involved to know that rugby listens, we care and we never stand still on player welfare. Concussion guidelines in rugby have always been and will continue to be guided by the latest scientific consensus. Still to come on the programme, knitware designer Justine Lee on celebrating British sheep

and all things woolly in her new book. And remember that you can enjoy Woman's Hour any hour of the day if you can't join us live at 10am during the week. Just subscribe to the daily podcast for free via BBC Sounds. Now, on Wednesday, 250 harvest mice were released into a nature reserve in Devon, helping to replenish the natural stocks of this under threat animal.

But the project wasn't conceived by a big conservation group or local wildlife centre. In fact, it barely involved adults at all. Instead, it came from the dedication of two 13-year-old naturalists, Eva Wishheart and Emily Smith, who bred the mice at home using empty fish tanks, plants from their garden, and a custom-built release enclosure. Well, Emily and Eva joined Anna Foster this. week and she began by asking how did the idea to help harvest mice first come about?

It started on a family camping trip to Derek Gowell's place. Derek Giles like a legendary ecologist and he breeds native endangered British wildlife like storks and beavers and waterfiles and harvest mice. So we saw the harvest mice and they're small and relatively easy to look after and you don't require a licence to breed them. So I thought we should get some of them. And we asked and in August 2022 we got our first two pairs of mice. But unfortunately the cat did eat three of the four. Okay, that's a learning curve, isn't it? One of the things, I can see you laughing, Emily. It's one of the things that you have to learn, Ellie. But it got a lot more successful after that, right? Yes, it did. In the first

year, we bred 80 harvest mice, and 68 of them were given to Derek Gow, and he released them in Cheshire. So I like to think of my mice living in Cheshire with Northern accents. Oh, definitely. Is it hard to do? Because it sounds to me like it must be quite a complicated thing to get the hang off? Yeah, it's very complicated. I mean, you have to sort out all the mice work out, who's going with who. And you can't tell them apart. It all requires on my pretty rubbish labelling systems. What's your labelling system look like? I don't have one. That's why it's rubbish. Do you just have to guess? Or do you have to look for their little distinguishing features on them? I write basic labels, but they don't help. They don't help. Well, look, I mean,

it's good to see. And Emily, you got involved in all of this as well. Eva's clearly a pretty good teacher. What was your favourite part of doing it, Emily? Probably just thinking that we're going to be able to make a stable population and that's going to be back in the ecosystem. Yeah, because I suppose that's the big part of it as well.

You get the enjoyment of doing something, but then also you know, and as you said, Eva, you were inspired by this. You know that actually the result of your hard work is for the greater good, for the natural world. Yeah. So, like, I

learn about all sorts of horrible things in books and on documentaries, what's happening to the world. And our future is very scary at the moment. So doing something, even though it's a tiny project with tiny creatures, it's really helping me to feel a lot better. Oh, that's really interesting, actually, to do something, because you're right, the world can be a scary place at times. And so if you're doing something positive, that really helps you, does it? Yeah, it does. Yeah. I wonder as well, and this is just me, I would find it really hard to let them go at the end. Do you not get attached to them? I do get attached to them. Yes, I'm very sentimental about my mice.

Are you? But in my garage, they are living in quite small tanks, and they don't have a lot of room. So releasing them into the world in their natural habitat is amazing. And we saw them yesterday in the dead hedge, which was lovely. Oh, yeah, that's a really good way of looking at it, actually, knowing that you're sending them out there to a better life. And as you said, particularly the ones that have northern accents. Do you ever think about the fact that they're going off and having new? families and having all of these adventures.

Exactly, yeah. It's my baby's going off into the world. Oh, that's cute. And I mean, this is just getting bigger and bigger. You had 27 fish tanks that you did all of this, because we said at the start 250 mice, which is a big project. I mean, I'm just wondering how this all fits in your house at this stage. We didn't really have enough space to be a whole 250. So we tried to breed 150. That didn't quite work because they haven't been breeding as fast as we hope. So we had to breed a whole 250. So we had to buy some off Derek and we needed to raise £4,050 and that's how the crowd funder got involved. Then Chris Packham posted it. Then there was a Packham effect and it shot up.

Yeah, it really did. And it's brilliant, as we were saying, to see the results of what you've achieved. What was it like that moment when you released them? It was really uplifting and, well, with Chris Packham there, it definitely felt like we were on Springwatch or Winter Watch or something. That was Emily Smith and Eva Wishheart there. Next, women who've been. been stalked or had to take out a restraining order have a much higher chance of suffering a heart attack or stroke. That's according to a new study from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. It followed a group of over 66,000 women across 10 years and found those who'd been stalked were 41% more likely to develop cardiovascular disease. And those who'd taken out a

restraining order, 71% more likely to have heart problems. Well, according to the latest data from the crime survey for England and Wales, one in five women in the UK has been a victim of stalking, and that figures even higher in the US. Well, I was joined by one of the lead researchers who carried out the study, Dr. Audrey Merchland, and I asked her why the study was carried out in the first place. We were interested in understanding women's cardiovascular health. Cardiovascular disease is a leading cause of death among women worldwide, and we we were interested in understanding kind of experiences in women's lives

that may be shaping their risk of cardiovascular disease. There's a growing body of work showing that intimate partner violence and experiences of violence increased risk of cardiovascular disease, but there's been less attention afforded to non-contact forms of violence,

such as stalking. And so we were really interested in kind of starting to evaluate whether experiences such as stalking are linked with women's cardiovascular health. So how did it work? How was this research, it out? So we utilized data that came from the Nurses Health Study 2, which is a large

prospective cohort of U.S. female nurses. Over 100,000 women in U.S. female nurses were enrolled in 1989, and they've been followed since. They're contacted every two years to ask questions about their health, health outcomes, health behaviors, and different exposures. In 2001, a subc cohort of over 66,000 women were asked a survey about experiences of trauma and violence, which included exposures to violence such as stalking and taking out a restraining order. And among these women, we've looked at women who did not have previous history of heart attacks or strokes. And so we looked at individuals who reported experiences stalking and looked at how the risk of heart attacks or strokes from 2001 through the end of follow-up about 2021.

So over 20 years of follow-up, and we looked at kind of frisk over that period. So what did you find then, and what was surprising to you? So we found that women who reported having experienced stocking in their lifetime by 2001 had a 41% increased risk of an incident heart attack or stroke over 20 years of follow-up. And women who reported obtaining a restraining order, which may or may not have been linked with the stocking, at an increased risk, of a 70% increased risk of heart attack or stroke over that 20-year follow-up. And our results were robust to accounting for socio-demographic, as well as lifestyle factors

and health conditions as well. So the results really seem robust to different kind of sensitivity analyses we conducted to see kind of how robust results were. And these are serious life-threatening conditions, aren't they? They are. They're very serious outcomes with profound impacts on women's health and well-being. So when we think about experiences such as stalking, often we think about women's mental health and well-being, but our results are really showing that also these experiences are quite severe and impactful, and they can really also impact women's physical health and cardiovascular health over the long term as well. Well, back in 2020, on a special Woman's Hour program specifically looking at stalking, TV presenter and podcaster, Isla Trequare,

spoke to us about her experience of stalking and the impact it had on her. I'm not okay. It's devastated me who I am. I'm a confident, outgoing, positive person. I was someone who viewed every day as an adventure. I was brave. I've confronted murderers and that didn't scare me anything near the terror I went through living in this idyllic countryside home. The, you know, are nightmares, I've got PTSD. I find going to the shops. It's not like a rational thing of, I don't think he's going to jump out from a corner or anything like that. But I just feel unsafe in the world and it's shaking me to my court. And stalking victims are serial victims.

And what a stalker takes from you, you cannot get back. And that is your sense of safety. I'm essentially a potential victim for the rest of my life. That was Isla Tricueira talking about her own experience. So Dr. Merchland, what kind of impact? can that constant fear have on the body? So we really think the length that we're observing between stocking and cardiovascular disease may be due to the psychological distress that women are experiencing.

So this flight or fight response that we even just heard this victim describe and that you're always looking over your shoulder, you're always in a state of heightened distress and concern for your safety. And we believe over long periods of time, this is disrupting the nervous system, impairing proper blood vessel functioning and can affect other biological mechanisms that's leading to increase cardiovascular disease over follow-up like we're seeing in our study.

From personal experience, about 10 years ago, I experienced stalking myself and I was given tips by the police about my safety, which was hugely useful. Things like changing my route home from work, driving around around about twice to make sure I wasn't being followed. Like I said, very useful.

but that sense of being on high alert for a long time did cause that stress. So do you think, therefore, that we should be thinking about stalking as a health condition? I think we should be thinking about stalking, not just as a criminal justice issue or a safety issue, but a public health issue that warrants additional research and attention that can focus on improving addressing. addressing, preventing, and improving violence against women societally and can focus also at improving health systems that can support survivors of these experiences long term. So do you think women then who have been the victim of stalking

should think about being checked over by a doctor? I'd first like to highlight that our findings don't necessarily mean that everyone that has experienced stalking will have hardest tax or strokes. We see that first that instead risk is higher on average and highlight how serious these experiences can be, which may also validate women's experiences of stalking. For women that are experiencing stocking, I would encourage them to connect with advocacy services and, of course, connect also with their health care provider. Our study isn't able to speak to individual level recommendations, and instead I'd really

like to kind of focus on zooming out and thinking about what are the ways in which we can prevent these experiences for women in the first place and also provide kind of better systems level responses to to survivors of these experiences a long term to improve their health. Just finally then, is the next stage for you looking at the direct link and why this happens within the body? Yes, I think the next stage in research is both to validate the findings in additional kind of other populations that have other demographic profiles and different experiences, as well as looking more particularly at the mechanisms that we're seeing between stalking and other non-contact forms of violence and these cardiovascular profiles to better

understand ways in which we might screen or intervene to improve health over time. That was Dr. Audrey Merchland there. Now, Justine Lee is a knitwear designer who's had a successful career designing for some of Britain's best-known fashion brands, including Laura Ashley, Whitestuff and Austin Reed. But in 2019, Justine picked up a book about fast fashion, discovering that fashion is one of the world's top ten most polluting industries, and she decided to do something about it. So 30 years after her first degree, she took on a master's in textile design, focusing on creating a model for sustainable knitwear. Well, her MA led her to discover 62 pure or ancient breeds of sheep, which she whittled down to

12 that she felt could produce a yarn that was soft enough to knit with and wear. And now she's co-written a book, The Wonder of Wool, and is doing innovative work to help protect the future of British rare breed sheep. Well, Justine joined Anita Rani this week, and she began by asking her, what was it about working with wool that she loved so much? Well, I suppose I've always been a fairly tactile designer. I mean, I think that wool is just a wonder fibre. as far as I'm concerned.

It's got so much diversity. It's great to wear. It's long-lasting. It's 100% biodegradable, mostly importantly. So it's always been a fibre that I'd like to work with. And you had been working in fashion and very successfully for such a long time. And yet it was in 2019 where your mind was truly opened to the cost of fashion. I actually really realised how damaging fashion was to the planet and the environmental damage.

was causing. So really I thought there must be a way to make more sustainable knitwear. And that's what really brought me to British Wool. Working on that ethos, you know, local fibre, instead of flying everything around the world, we actually have something like 33 million sheep on the island. And, you know, there's 62 different pure breeds. I mean, there's so much diversity and choice that it seemed like the natural fibre to work with. And so what is happening to British wool generally? Well, it's difficult. At the moment, it's very hard for farmers. I think, you know, it's been in the press a lot, how low the wool price is. I have some swatches here. Lovely, very tactile. This is just a few of the 62. When I was up doing my research, I actually

for my masters, I decided to knit every breed. And that's how I discovered, you know, some of the great ones. I mean, I came from the Kashmir industry. And I was really hoping I'd find a... Well, you wanted to find something just as soft. Yes, I was trying to find the kind of soft, the cashmere of British sheep. And were you successful? Nearly. I mean, I found some that are probably as soft as a kind of marino sort of standard. But it's so diverse.

I mean, even if you find a breed that has lovely soft fleece, it varies from sheep to sheep because, you know, they're not genetically modified. They are all different. So it's quite a hunt to find a very good. We've got to talk about the women that you work with and the women in this industry, the shepherds and the wool producers in this area of rare breed sheep. Why is this work, is this work mostly done by women? And if so, why? Well, I wouldn't say obviously shepherding is not just women.

But I think the emphasis on the wool tends to come from the women shepherds, I think. Obviously, you know, it is so varied that I think women shepherds notice that. this and want to do something with it, all the women that, all the companies that I buy my rare breed fleeces from are run by women and they seem to... That's interesting. Yeah, they seem to understand the softness. They actually care, you know, they kind of feel the fleeces and go, oh, this is really soft, you know, try this one.

How do you go about finding all 62 rare breeds? Well, each breed actually has its own cheap society, which is fantastic. So I can, you know, phone up, if I want the Lester Longwall, for instance, or the border Lester, there is a sheep society. So I contact them and then they tell me where the farmers are and that's how I get to get. I mean, I was surprised actually in London, how many we have in London City. In city farms? Yes. I mean, this is fantastic.

When I was researching, there's the border Lester, for instance. And then the lady from the sheep society phoned up and said, oh, there's something, Wonsworth. I was like, you know, it was one of the kind of rarest breed. Well, once earth, you know, it's just down the corner from me. So that was fantastic. And then I realised that there was Castlewilt Moritz in Spitalfields. I mean, it's a beautiful coffee table book. And I love kind of reading about the history of things that you never knew.

And that sheep are not, they're not native to Britain. No, well, they came in in the Neolithic time. So they've been here quite a little time. And we started off with those, the little brown native sheep, which are similar to our breed at the moment. Soe, that's almost the same. Then we had the Roman invasion who bought the lovely long wool, big, larger sheep.

And then we had the Vikings that bought the blackface mountain. So this was the origins to all of our breeds. These three different types. And Romans really knew what they were doing. The Romans bought the beautiful white long walls, which have this amazing luster. We call it luster, but it's where all the stories of the golden fleas came from. If you, I mean, the one I'm wearing is actually from the Lester Longwall,

which is part of from that line. And if the sun catches it, it kind of shimmers. You know, there's a kind of glint to it, which is amazing, because it's all natural. If it's okay with you, Justin, I'm going to read out some of the messages that we've got. Yes, of course. Our listeners. Because we're just talking about fast fashion and how they feel about some of their items of clothing. On Sunday, I cut up a prized black satin pleated skirt, which I'd only. for 22 years to repurpose into a cape for my five-year-old daughter to wear to a party. It hasn't fitted for five years, but I couldn't quite part with it. I feel relieved that it's now being treasured for Harry Potter dressing up.

My 16-year-old self would have laughed hugely at this. Another one, Alison, says, I knitted myself an Aaron sweater when I was a student in 1959 to 1963. Did it take that long? I suppose they could. The sweater having been worn by three teenage sons is now newly mended and carefully washed, just about to go off to Exiton University as my 18-year-old granddaughter Madeline loves it.

She's lived in tropical countries all her life and will now face a Devon, autumn and winter in it, a timeless garment. That must make you feel joy here. It shows the durability of wool. You know, you buy a synthetic jumper and it just looks pilly and starts losing shape quite quickly.

But, you know, I have a wool jumper that I've had for... I knitted when I was at college, which was going back to the 1987, and I still wear it. actually my daughter now wears it as well. So, you know, wool does go on and on and it is, it is a wonder fibre. What's about cost? Cost is, the problem is, it's all about scale. If you're working with a rare breed cheap, you know, there's probably maybe only a few hundred of them. Obviously, buying the wool, you've either got to hand process the fleece or you

have to take it to a mini mill. That can make the yarn quite expensive. It's all about scale. If more people bought them. We could go through the system that exists, which is all set up for volume. So if we can get it up to a better volume, the price of the wool of the finished wool comes down and therefore we can support some of the farmers by actually paying more for their wool from the sheep.

That was Justine Lee there and her book, The Wonder of Wool, is out now. And that's it from me. On Monday's Woman's Hour, Nula will be joined in the studio by actor Robin Wright to talk about her new psychological thriller The Girlfriend, which she directs and stars in. Join us from 10am. But from me, have a lovely weekend and thank you very much for listening.