In the 1960s the birthrate in Greenland was one of the highest in the world. Then it plunged. Decades later, women have finally begun speaking out about what happened

Bula Larson was 14 when one day she and her friends were told to go to the hospital. Bula lived in Greenland and was Inuit like most of the population of the island, which is an autonomous territory of Denmark. At the hospital she and her friends lined up, and one-by-one were told to enter a room. Bula recalls how she was asked to sit on a bed with ‘cold metal stirrups’ where, to her shock, she was fitted with an IUD, a contraceptive coil she had never asked for or agreed to have.

Today, more than 100 women are suing the Danish government for a policy of forced contraception. Helen Pidd hears how thousands of Inuit women and girls – some aged just 13 – were fitted with coils. Many say this was done without their or their parents’ consent, and caused lasting damage.

This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.