HIV/AIDS

According to the latest (2008) WHO and UNAIDS global estimates, women comprise 50% of people living with HIV.

In sub-Saharan Africa, women constitute 60% of people living with HIV. In other regions, men having sex with men (MSM), injecting drug users (IDU), sex workers and their clients are among those most-at-risk for HIV, but the proportion of women living with HIV has been increasing in the last 10 years

 A workshop on gender violence and HIV/AIDS organised by Gender and Child's Right Initiative (GCRI), a Non Governmental Organisation (NGO) dedicated to uplifting the status of women and young persons, has ended in Lagos.

The workshop took place at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), Victoria Island, Lagos, in conjunction with Vital Voices Global Partnership, an international NGO that manages Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation project on African Women. The workshop, tagged Engaging Business and Corporate Organisations in Health and Social Issues held under the distinguished chairmanship of Professor Osita Eze, Director General, Nigeria Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), Lagos. The objective of the project was to advocate for change in public policy while sensitising corporate organisations on gender-based violence and HIV/AIDS. It was also to build strong networks of business and corporate organisations to lend their voices to advocacy work in this area. The workshop attracted several corporate organisations which include MTN, NGOs, Government representatives and Journalists.

The female condom - currently the only female-controlled method of preventing HIV - is rarely available to women who need it. Blaming poor marketing and insufficient investment, activists at the International AIDS Conference in Mexico City said failure to promote the female condom had hurt global HIV prevention efforts.

"When the female condom first came to us, it was marketed to sex workers, women in bars, and other women thought to be at high risk of HIV or to have loose morals," said Gladys Chiwome, of Zimbabwe's Women and AIDS Support Network, which promotes the use of the female condom in the southern African nation. "As a result, women who thought they were safe, such as married women, were, and still are, reluctant to use it."

Coverage of the International AIDS Conference in Mexico City has once again pointed to Botswana as a "success story" in the fight against HIV/AIDS.  Reporting on new data from the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) Brenda Wilson of National Public Radio said:  "Take Botswana, which had one of the highest rates of HIV in Southern Africa.  And the government and international organizations put in strong prevention and treatment programs. Prevalence among teen girls dropped from 25 percent to 18 percent."

I have another side of the story to tell. 

Botswana is a mid-income country and so, was one of the first to provide antiretroviral treatment and institute programs to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV. This is one fundamental reason that we can claim some success. But Botswana continues to have one of the highest HIV rates in the world, and most of the new infections are among women and young people. Today, if you meet 20 young women between the ages of 15 and 24 in Botswana, it is likely that at least 3 of them are living with HIV. The situation in Botswana is controversial because some organizations working in the country have very little understanding of how the rights of women living with HIV/AIDS are being violated.

Early in the epidemic, HIV infection and AIDS were diagnosed for relatively few women and female adolescents (although we know now that many women were infected with HIV through injection drug use but that their infections were not diagnosed).  Today, women account for more than one quarter of all new HIV/AIDS diagnoses. Women of colour are especially affected by HIV infection and AIDS.

This policy seeks to contribute towards promoting effective prevention and care within the context of the public education system.It was developed by the South African Department of Education in August 1999.

This document was initiated by the Department of Health, and applies to the period 2000-2005. It is a broad national strategic plan designed to guide the country’s response as a whole tothe epidemic. It is not a plan for the health sector specifically, but a statement of intent for the country as a whole, both within and outside government. The plan has sinece been updated, with a new document covering 2005-2010.

This report covers progress made by Gender Links as the lead agency for the policy arm of the Media Action Plan on HIV/AIDS and Gender. It begins with a general overview followed by country reports. Attached at Annex A is a list of the country facilitators for the MAP policy roll out and their contact information. Attached at Annex B is a composite plan for the roll out in each country for 2007/2008, showing how facilitators plan to complete work started as well as approach new media houses to achieve the MAP target of eighty percent of all media houses in the region having HIV and AIDS and Gender policies by the end of 2008.