<< back to table of contents

Women and the HIV/AIDS Crisis (by Rashid Zuberu)

As young people become old enough to explore their sexuality, their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS rises. Yet in many African countries there is often opposition to introducing topics relating to sex and reproductive health in school curricula. Young women are especially vulnerable. In some urban settings, female African adolescents 15 to 19 years old suffer six times the rate of HIV infection as their male counterparts. In sub-Saharan Africa, women make up 55 percent of the infected population. Women also have greater biological vulnerability to the virus and are often unable to protect themselves because they cannot refuse sex with their male partners or demand that condoms be used. Women also carry the burden of passing the virus to their children via pregnancy and breastfeeding. Therefore, programmes need to take into account women's particular needs as well as target their male partners.

The sexual behaviours of today's youth will shape the course of the AIDS pandemic in the future. In developing countries, recent data indicate that about half of all new HIV infections are among 15 to 24 year olds. Moreover young men and women in this age range have the highest incidence of sexually transmitted infections (STI's) of the all age groups. In many cases, programmes for young people can help them adopt safe behaviours. But in some situations, such as sexual abuse, early marriage, or sexual activity due to poverty, young people are forced into unsafe sex. HIV/AIDS and violence are two major and interrelated health problems affecting women worldwide. Programmes and policies are needed to protect them.

Research has shown that the gender-based imbalance in power found in the socio-economic sphere is frequently reflected in sexual relationships. Beliefs about masculinity and family affect the sexuality of both men and women as well as their risk of HIV and other STI's. Societal expectations of men and women also have an impact on their care and support needs, for example: the burden of AIDS related care often fall disproportionately on women. There is the need to identify ways to improve HIV/AIDS programmes and services through operations research that takes gender and sexuality into account. HIV/AIDS related stigmatization and discrimination threaten the effectiveness of prevention and care programmes.

Promoting community solidarity among sex workers can be an important factor in successful adoption of key prevention behaviours, including health-seeking behaviours, the ability to deal with violence and requiring clients to use condoms. There is increasing recognition of the important role that norms and roles related to gender play in HIV risk among young men by using a gender approach. Research strategy explicitly acknowledges that individuals are embedded in social and structural contexts that must also be addressed to create an environment that is supportive of behavior change. The prevalence of HIV infection among young Zambians ages 15 to 20 years is estimated to be 20 percent with females five times more likely to be infected as males.

Fear, ignorance and denial lead people to react to people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWA) in ways that can have negative effects on individuals, families and communities. Those at risk or already infected may not seek prevention and care services for fear of being stigmatized by service providers or their community. Despite the scope of and severity of the problem there is little documentation of the causes and manifestation of stigma or consensus on how to mitigate the problem. According to the UNAIDS framework for Global leadership on HIV/AIDS an expanded response to the epidemic is one that simultaneously acts on reducing risk vulnerability and impact. The impact of HIV/AIDS on individuals, families, communities, societies and nations goes far beyond physical illness and death; it encompasses socio-economic effects, including increased poverty and hunger; demographic effects like an increase in orphans ad vulnerable children; community effects like the weakening of the educational sector due to high morbidity and mortality among teachers.

Recent gains in child survival rates are threatened by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Without treatment, HIV positive pregnant women have at least a 30 percent chance of passing the virus to their newborns. Each year, approximately 600,000 infants, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa, are born with HIV infections as a result of mother-to-child transmission of HIV. The rising number of HIV infected children places an enormous burden on families and the health care system. Mother-to-child transmission of HIV can be greatly reduced by expanding high quality antenatal and obstetric care, voluntary HIV counseling and testing (VCT) antiretroviral drug therapy and the use of breast milk substitutes or exclusive breast feeding. Programmes for prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) can have an additional public health impact by reaching HIV negative women who receive information, skills training and support for preventive behaviours.

Clearly, women are more vulnerable to the HIV/AIDS pandemic than their male counterparts. The era where women are classified as second class human beings should be done away with. All around the world, women are beaten to death by their husbands and fathers, still raped with impunity in wars and conflicts, still battered and abused as part of their daily lives. The majority of children who are out of school are girls and the majority of people bought and sold in the trafficking business are girls.

The problem lies with the very way women's rights are perceived: that somehow, women's rights are not important and that women are second-class human beings. The amazing thing is that humankind thinks it can afford to wait. We do not have a sense of urgency about changing this situation. This should be the first century; the start of a new era ensuring women's rights are respected. It is our individual commitment to change as well as our institutional and joint action that will allow us to transform the world for women, for men and for our children. For all our sakes we must not fail.

Statistics clearly underscore the significant and important roles that women will need to play for the development and sustainability of today's world and that urgent action must be taken to integrate women into society on all levels. The wrong that is being committed against women all over the world must be brought to an abrupt end.

<< back to table of contents