Like many nations, Cameroon has a teen pregnancy problem that isn’t being adequately addressed. The solution many have turned to is utterly horrifying: In an attempt to make their daughters less desirable to boys, mothers are ironing their breasts with hot objects to prevent them from developing.
In a report on the practice that affects one in four girls in Cameroon, CNN interviews Grace Techu, a mother who began ironing her daughter’s breasts before school every day when she was nine. Techu used a hot pestle heated in the fire, but others use hot stones or coconut shells to beat at girls’ breasts. This is supposed to discourage the growth of breast tissue, but all it does is severly injure girls. According to a State Department human rights report, breast ironing often leaves girls with, “burns, deformities, and psychological problems.”