August 5 The cheap way of destroying a woman’s life is common in parts of Asia, but incidents are on the rise in the West.
BOGOTA, Colombia – every glance at a mirror transports Consuelo Cordoba to the moment when her boyfriend doused her with a skin-searing acid that obliterated her face, leaving her with gruesome wounds that will never heal.
The chemical burned off an ear, melted an eye, ate through her lower face and ruined her teeth. she now wears a skin-tight elastic mask, breathes through a straw-like tube that protrudes from her nose and walks the streets looking "like a monster," as she put it.
"I would like to go to sleep today and not wake up tomorrow," she said. "The truth is life is too hard and I am alone."
A cheap and quick way of destroying a woman’s life, acid attacks in India, Afghanistan and Bangladesh have received widespread attention in recent years, with a documentary about victims in Pakistan winning an Oscar this year.
While the gruesome assaults have been rare in the West, a rising number of attacks in Colombia has alarmed prosecutors and public health officials and terrified women. Dozens of such attacks, in which assailants soak their victims with sulfuric or nitric acids, are believed to take place here each year.
The precise reason for the spike here — and not in, say, neighboring Peru — is not known. But women’s rights advocates in Colombia talk about an epidemic of violence against women. they range from spouse-battering cases so extreme that they make the nightly news to reports of illegal armed groups using rape as a weapon in a murky rural conflict.
"sometimes in the West we make fast judgments and say, ‘Look how terrible they treat women in the East,’ and we don’t look first at ourselves," said Monica Roa, the Bogota-based international programs director of Women’s Link Worldwide, a rights group.
"The violence here may be different, but it emanates from the same place. This is a culture where machismo reigns, where men do what they want to do."
If a woman is attacked over a dowry in India or because she ventured outside without a veil in Pakistan, in Colombia a woman might be attacked because of sheer rage over her independence or even by a disturbed man she doesn’t know.
That’s what happened in 2004 to Maria Cuervo when a complete stranger shouted, "This is so you don’t think you’re so pretty" and drenched her face with acid.
Mostly, though, a jilted boyfriend or a husband intoxicated with jealousy is behind the attack.
"he had hit me because of jealousy, so I ended it," Erica Vanessa Vargas, a slight, soft-spoken woman of 20, said of the day she ended her relationship with a boyfriend four years ago. "he then said, ‘If you’re not mine, than no one will have you.’"
Her former boyfriend paid a small boy $1.75 to throw acid at her — changing the course of a young life. "I stopped going to school, I can’t work, I can’t depend on my own self," said Vargas, wearing a scarf to shield her scarred neck and chin.
The statistics on acid attacks are hazy in Colombia, as in other countries where they take place.
Bogota city councilwoman Olga Rubio, a victims’ advocate, said about 100 of the assaults have taken place so far this year across Colombia. it is a pace that would easily surpass last year’s total of 150.
The state’s forensic science institute registers more than eight cases a month, though most involve male victims, many of whom were assaulted by muggers using acid as a weapon. The attorney general’s office, meanwhile, said it is investigating 56 cases, 36 of them involving women.
But Attorney General Eduardo Montealegre said he believes "a considerable volume of crimes and aggressions are not reported."
"Experience shows that what’s reported does not correspond to reality," he said, explaining that victims are sometimes attacked by relatives and fear coming forward.
Noting an increase in acid attacks, Montealegre said he is creating a new team of prosecutors and crime-scene experts to investigate the crimes. The team would also determine whether authorities have inadvertently downgraded the gravity of reported acid attacks, instead of cataloguing some of them as attempted homicides.
The perpetrators often receive no jail time because the attacks are treated as minor assaults, said Sen. Carlos Baena.
"The punishment is very light and doesn’t take into account the very dramatic pain that the victim has to go through," said Baena, who is sponsoring a bill to impose at least a 20-year prison term on convicted attackers.
He and the city councilwoman, Rubio, are also proposing regulations to require buyers of acids to register their purchase.
Such reforms might have an impact. The number of attacks in Bangladesh fell from about 500 a year a decade ago to about 100 a year after that country imposed tougher sentencing guidelines and began to register acid sales, said Jaf Shah, the executive director of London-based Acid Survivors Trust International.
Health care providers describe a heinous crime that can literally wipe away a victim’s face.
Linda Guerrero, director of the Foundation for the Burned, which provides plastic surgery, physical therapy and psychological assistance to victims, said the chemicals in the acids corrode the proteins in facial skin and sear through delicate tissue.
"It’s the worst thing that can happen to your skin," she said.en away."
The Psychological Impact:There are many reasons why someone might decide to ‘go under the knife’. For some the issue may be one of self-confidence, and the life-changing results of plastic surgery can be just that – life changing. A correction to the nose that was ‘too big’ or the breasts that were ‘too small’ can impact a person’s life immeasurably. the confidence gained could lead to an improved social life and in turn, improved relationships. For others, the primary reason may be due to the lasting scars of bullying as a child. the teasing endured because of those teeth or nose can have had such an emotional impact that the person has learned to live in a way that is designed to avoid the cruelty of others; refusing to smile or pose for pictures, for instance.
Possible Impact to Health:Surgery in whatever form, is still surgery. whilst it is perfectly likely to expect that nothing will go wrong, and the chances of something going wrong is small, the risks are still real and it is important to be aware of what they are.Specific types of cosmetic surgery carry their own specific risks, but some risks are common to most, if not all, procedures. these include; infection, hemorrhaging, paralysis, nerve damage, to name a few.Should you take the decision to approach a surgeon for an initial consultation, you will be given the opportunity to talk through the risks associated with the given procedure. there are precautions you can take to offset potential risks and your surgeon will discuss these with you too. if you subsequently decide you would like to go ahead with the procedure, you will be given detailed instructions as to what you should and shouldn’t do in the run up to surgery. you will be advised as to the medicines you will need to avoid and any medicines you will need to take in advance.
Many people turn to plastic surgeons to have their facial features corrected but Lee says that talking to your dentist is wise.“People think dentists are for teeth problems but in fact the range of dental treatment is vaster than you think. the oral and maxillofacial surgery department ranges from protruded lips to all other areas concerning the teeth and jaw line,” Lee said. the dentist stressed that dentists are more suitable for dealing with jaw issues. “It’s now about sawing your jaw. it is about removing the right amount of jaw bone and replacing the other places. it is very sophisticated,” he said. “Dentists need to look into one’s jaw and faces in various aspects. Using cephalometric radiography and dental model, one should be able to diagnose the exact problem and even predict the outcome exactly. Dentists are also the capable of adapting their knowledge in teeth, gum, misalignments and other areas to the surgery, which could secure safety and sophistication in the whole process as well as the outcome,” Lee said. “the technique as well as its tools and devices have evolved over the past 50 years of oral and maxillofacial surgery,” Lee said. By Bae Ji-sook (baejisook@heraldm.com)
