Companies may ban Muslim employees from wearing a headscarf under certain conditions, the European Union’s top court said on Thursday (July 15) in a ruling on two cases brought by women in Germany who were suspended from their jobs for wearing one. The issue of the hijab, the traditional headscarf worn around the head and shoulders, has caused controversy across Europe for years and underlined sharp differences over integrating Muslims.

In the cases brought to court, both Muslim women – a special-needs carer at a childcare centre in Hamburg run by a charitable association, and a cashier at the Mueller drugstore chain – did not wear headscarves when they started in their jobs, but decided to do so years later after coming back from parental leave.

They were told that this was not allowed, and were at different points either suspended, told to come to work without it or put on a different job, court documents show. The EU court had to decide in both cases whether headscarf bans at work represented a violation of the freedom of religion or were allowed as part of the freedom to conduct a business and the wish to project an image of neutrality to customers.

Its response was that such bans were possible if justified by an employer’s need to present a neutral image. “A prohibition on wearing any visible form of expression of political, philosophical or religious beliefs in the workplace may be justified by the employer’s need to present a neutral image towards customers or to prevent social disputes,” the court said.
However, that justification must correspond to a genuine need on the part of the employer, it said.

In the case of the care centre employee, the court said the rule at issue appeared to have been applied in a general and indifferentiated way, since the employer also required an employee wearing a religious cross to remove that sign.

In both cases, it will now be up to national courts to have the final say on whether there was any discrimination. The EU court already ruled in 2017 that companies may ban staff from wearing Islamic headscarves and other visible religious symbols under certain conditions, sparking a backlash among faith groups.

More than 5 million Muslims live in Germany, making them the largest religious minority group there. Headscarf bans for women at work have been a hotly contested issue in Germany for years, mostly with regard to aspiring teachers at state schools and trainee judges. This has not so far been a major theme in the campaign for this year’s legislative elections.

Elsewhere in Europe, courts have also had to look into where and how headscarves can sometimes be banned at work. France’s top court upheld in 2014 the dismissal of a Muslim day care worker for wearing a headscarf at a private crèche that demanded strict neutrality from employees. 
France, home to Europe’s largest Muslim minority, prohibited the wearing of Islamic headscarves in state schools in 2004.

However, Austria’s constitutional court has ruled that a law there banning girls aged up to 10 from wearing headscarves in schools was discriminatory.

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London: The ovarian reserve of women previously infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus causing COVID-19, is not adversely affected, and their chance of success from fertility treatment remains as it was before the infection, finds a study.

Ovarian reserve describes the ability of the ovary to produce eggs for fertilisation (natural and medical) and pregnancy.

The study, led by researchers at IVI Madrid, a fertility clinic in Spain, provides further reassurance for those planning fertility treatment with IVF. The findings were presented at ESHRE’s 37th annual meeting taking place online from 26 June to July 1.

The study described intrauterine infection via placental or congenital routes as unlikely, and reported that perinatal infection found at and after delivery was a more likely explanation for any neonatal infection.

The team monitored hormone levels, in all 46 women having IVF in Spain between May and June 2020, which included measurements of anti-Mullerian hormone (AMH) — a marker of ovarian reserve. AMH has become a widely used measurement in fertility clinics in recent years, able to predict how patients might respond to ovarian stimulation in IVF.

It suggested they would be normal or low responders to ovarian stimulation when treatment began.

“Generally, the data showed no variation in AMH levels before and after SARS-CoV-2 infection, and we could assume that the chances of success in their fertility treatment remained intact,” said Dr Maria Cruz Palomino from IVI Madrid.

However, the results did show a slight decline in AMH measurements in those predicted to be normal responders, which Palomino said was not a “radical decrease” and unlikely to compromise ovarian reserve — nor, she added, “can we attribute this variation to SARS-Cov-2 infection”.

There have been concerns because the virus invades its target cells by binding to the ACE2 receptor, which is widely expressed in the ovaries (as well as the uterus, vagina and placenta). This has caused some anxiety for women contemplating fertility treatment.

But the study suggests that, while there was a variation in levels of AMH as a marker of ovarian reserve, this variation appeared dependent on patient response to ovarian stimulation, not on previous infection. “Nevertheless, we could assume that the chances of success of fertility treatment remain intact,” said Palomino.

New York: While eating milk chocolate every day may sound like a recipe for weight gain, starting the day with a concentrated amount of chocolate may help the body burn fat and decrease blood sugar levels, finds a study.

Researchers from the Brigham collaborated with investigators at the University of Murcia in Spain, examined the effects of eating milk chocolate in morning hours on a small group of postmenopausal women.

The study published in The FASEB Journal showed that morning or nighttime chocolate intake did not lead to weight gain. On the contrary, eating chocolate in the morning or in the evening showed to influence hunger and appetite, microbiota composition, and sleep.

A high intake of chocolate during the morning hours can also help to burn fat and reduce blood glucose levels and evening or night intake of chocolate altered next-morning resting and exercise metabolism.

“Our findings highlight that not only ‘what’ but also ‘when’ we eat can impact physiological mechanisms involved in the regulation of body weight,” said Frank A.J.L. Scheer, Neuroscientist from the Department of Medicine and Neurology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

“Our volunteers did not gain weight despite increasing caloric intake. Our results show that chocolate reduces ad libitum energy intake, consistent with the observed reduction in hunger, appetite and the desire for sweets shown in previous studies,” said Marta Garaulet, also from the hospital.

For the study, the team conducted a randomised, controlled, cross-over trial of 19 postmenopausal women who consumed either 100g of chocolate in the morning (within one hour after waking time) or at night (within one hour before bedtime). They compared weight gain and many other measures to no chocolate intake.

Islamabad (Pakistan): Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan is once again in the eye of storm after he said, once again, that a rise in sexual assault cases in the country was linked to how women dress.

This is barely two months after the Pakistan Prime Minister comments on sexual violence had drawn severe backlash. In April, during a question and answer session with the public, Khan had said that the rise in sexual violence in Pakistan, particularly against children, was caused due to “fahashi” (vulgarity). This time, he suggested that avoiding “temptation in society” is the way to prevent sexual violence against women.

Defending his earlier remarks, in an interview with “Axios on HBO”, Imran Khan said “…I said the concept of ‘purdah’. Avoid temptation in society. We don’t have discos here, we don`t have nightclubs. It is a completely different society way of life here. So if you raise temptation in society to a point – all these young guys have nowhere to go – it has a consequence in the society.”

Answering a question if the woman’s clothes can provoke sexual violence, Khan said, “If a woman is wearing very few clothes it will have an impact on the men unless they are robots. It’s common sense.”

When further prodded, he added, “It depends which society you live in. If in a society people have not seen that sort of thing, it will have an impact on them.”

Calling Imran Khan a “sick, misogynistic, degenerate”, Pakistan Muslim League (PML) spokesperson Marriyum Aurangzeb came down heavily on the Pakistan Prime Minister. “The world got an insight into a mindset of a sick, misogynistic, degenerate & derelict IK. It is not women’s choices that lead to sexual assault rather the choices of men who choose to engage in this dispicable and vile crime,” Aurangzeb tweeted. “Maybe the misogynist, degenerate can defend paedophiles and murderers, as he advocates for rapist. After all, men cannot be expected to control temptation,” she added.

Official statistics in Pakistan have revealed that at least 11 rape incidents are reported in the country every day, with over 22,000 cases reported to the police in the last six years. However, only 77 of the accused have been convicted which comprises 0.3 per cent of the total figure, reported Geo News. 

(With ANI inputs)

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Washington: Amazon.com Inc was hit on Wednesday (May 19) with five new lawsuits by women who worked in corporate or warehouse management roles, and accused the online retailer of gender bias, racial bias or both.

The women, ages 23 to 64, accused Amazon of favoring men over women in career growth, allowing supervisors to denigrate them, and retaliating after they complained.

Two plaintiffs are Black, one is Latina, one is Asian-American and one is white. They filed their lawsuits in federal courts in Arizona, California, Delaware and Amazon`s hometown of Seattle.

An Amazon spokesman said the company has found no evidence supporting the accusations. He also said Amazon does not tolerate discrimination or harassment and supports a “diverse, equitable and inclusive culture.”

The lawsuits were filed by the Wigdor law firm, which also represents a Black manager at Amazon Web Services who sued in March over alleged systemic discrimination.

Wednesday`s (May 19) plaintiffs included Cindy Warner, a gay executive in that unit, who said a male manager openly called her a “bitch,” an “idiot” and a “nobody,” and that Amazon terminated her job after learning she had hired a lawyer.

Pearl Thomas, one of the Black plaintiffs, said a human resources employee downplayed concerns about her treatment by saying Thomas was upset by current events and that “my name is not Derek Chauvin,” the white former Minneapolis police officer convicted of murdering George Floyd.

The Wigdor firm has also represented women who accused now-convicted movie producer Harvey Weinstein of sexual misconduct, and Fox News employees alleging bias or harassment there.

In April, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos said his company needed to take care of employees better, and Amazon said it wanted more Blacks in senior and corporate roles.

Amazon ended 2020 with about 1.3 million full- and part-time employees.

The company is urging shareholders at its May 26 annual meeting to reject a proposal requiring an independent audit analyzing its “impacts on civil rights, equity, diversity and inclusion.”
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London: Most patients hospitalised for COVID-19 infection return to full health, but one in three may develop lung damage even after a year, according to a study published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine.

People are most commonly hospitalised for COVID-19 infection when it affects the lungs — termed COVID-19 pneumonia. A study showed that even after a year, a third of patients’ measures of lung function were reduced, particularly how efficiently oxygen is transferred in the lungs into the blood. This was more frequently found in women than in men.

In around a quarter of patients CT scans showed there were still small areas of change in the lungs, and this was more common in patients with more severe lung changes at time of hospitalisation. About 5 percent of patients still reported breathlessness, found researchers from the University of Southampton in the UK.

“The majority of patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia appeared to fully recover, although for some patients this took many months. Women were more likely to have persistent reductions in lung function tests and further investigation is needed to understand if there is a sex specific difference in how patient’s recover,” said Mark Jones, Associate Professor in Respiratory Medicine at the varsity.

“We also don’t yet know what happens beyond 12 months and this will need ongoing study,” Jones added.

The team worked with collaborators in Wuhan, China, to investigate the natural history of recovery from severe COVID-19 pneumonia up to one year after hospitalisation. About 83 patients were recruited after they were discharged from hospital following severe COVID-19 pneumonia and were followed up after three, six, nine and twelve months.

The research provides evidence that routine respiratory follow-up of patients hospitalised with COVID-19npneumonia is required. It also highlights the need for exploring treatment strategies, including the role of exercise programmes to prevent the development of long term COVID-19 related lung changes.

 

Ahmedabad: Even as the coronavirus cases continue to surge across the country, hundereds of women gathered at Navapura village in Sanand of Gujarat’s Ahmedabad district to offer prayers at the Baliyadev temple violating the Covid-19 restrictions put in place.

KT Kamaria, Deputy Superintendent of Police, Ahmedabad Rural, said action has been taken against 23 people, including the village sarpanch, in connection with the incident, which took place on Tuesday.

Besides, music being played by a DJ can also be heard in the video of the incident, which soon went viral.

READ: UP Lockdown Extended; Covid Restrictions To Remain Effective Till Monday, 7 AM

The people of Gujarat seem to have been flabbergasted with this incident with a person on Twitter lambasting the state government and the local administration for permitting such an event.

“#Ahmedabad: Amid #CoronaPandemic thousands throng during a religious event in Sanand. How did the local administration give permission for such an event? Is the Gujarat Government sleeping?” he wrote on the micro-blogging platform and posted the video of the incident.

This comes even as the state reported over 13,000 new Covid-19 cases on Tuesday.