The Auckland Women’s Health Council is a voluntary organisation of individual women and women’s groups who have an interest in and commitment to women’s health issues. The organisation was formed in 1988 to provide a voice on women’s health issues in the Auckland region.
The Council has a special interest in patient rights, informed consent and decision-making in health care, health consumer advocacy, the Code of Health Consumers’ Rights, the National Cervical Screening Programme, and ethics – issues that were highlighted during the Inquiry into the treatment of cervical cancer at National Women’s Hospital in 1987-88 and in the recommendations contained in the report known as the Cartwright Report.
Our Philosophy
The Auckland Women’s Health Council is a feminist organisation. We believe:
- Women users of health services have the right to make informed decisions regarding their own health care and treatment.
- Women/wāhine have the right to the information necessary to enable them to make informed decisions.
- Health care must be accessible, affordable and available as well as culturally appropriate and acceptable to women/wāhine.
- Consumer participation on all decision-making processes for health care services is essential.
Vision
All women/wāhine in Tāmaki Makaurau and across Aotearoa New Zealand have agency over their physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well-being and are fully informed of health services available and have access to them, particularly wāhine Māori.
Goal
To provide an independent feminist voice focused on women’s/family health and health services in Tāmaki Makaurau.
Priorities
1. That the Council works towards becoming Tangata Tiriti as an organisation: to understand our responsibilities as a good Treaty partner; and to stand with tangata whenua in their language rights, their health rights, for the rights of their tamariki and wāhine. To find ways to honour the articles of Te Tiriti.
2. That women/wāhine have the right to make informed decisions regarding their own health care and treatment.
3. That women/wāhine participate in all decision-making processes for health care services.
4. That women/wāhine have accessible, affordable, available, accountable and culturally appropriate health care services.
5. That the work of the Council continues to be sustainable and to grow.
6. Increasing our links and collaborations with other women’s health related organisations.
38 Years After the Cartwright Inquiry, Women Are Being Failed by a New Cervical Screening Register That is Not Fit for Purpose
How is it that in the second quarter of the 21st century, with all the technological advancements that we have, we have an IT system that has let us down so badly ?
Two days before the 38th anniversary of the release of the Cartwright Inquiry Report a report commissioned by HealthNZ revealed serious failings in the functionality of a new cervical screening Register that have potentially put thousands of women/wāhine at risk.
- Almost one million screening notifications – 968,000 or almost 63% of the eligible population in 2025 – were never sent to eligible women.
- Women’s screening histories were never properly transitioned onto the new Register.
- There is a concerning level of clinical risk arising from the excessive number of recommendation mismatches between screening laboratories and the Register.
For the Auckland Women’s Health Council, Cartwright Collective, and Federation of Women’s Health Councils Aotearoa, this is a sickening echo of history.
The 2001 Gisborne Cervical Screening Inquiry — itself only eight years after the NCSP began — found the register at the time was in such a sub-optimal state that results were routinely under-reported, with normal or negative readings issued for what were in fact abnormal or precancerous cells. Women were, in the words of that Inquiry, “severely injured” as a result. The entire rationale for a centralised, high-quality register was to make sure this could never happen again.
Yet, it has happened again.
Our Community
Our Supporters
Auckland Women’s Health Council also acknowledges and thanks our funders, Lottery Community and COGS. Without their ongoing funding and support we would not be able to continue our work.
