Africa: Gender Finally Moving to Forefront of AIDS Fight

A recently released report examines the intersection of HIV/AIDS and gender in three African countries and the role three major donors play in fighting the epidemic.

"Moving Beyond Gender As Usual" scrutinizes the efforts of the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief program; the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria; and the World Bank's Multi-Country AIDS Program in Mozambique, Uganda, and Zambia. On July 1, representatives from development, governmental, donor, and gender advocacy groups met in Washington to discuss the report's findings.

HIV infection rates among women have risen steadily since the start of the epidemic, and females now comprise 61 percent of all cases in sub-Saharan Africa. In some countries there, infection rates among young women far surpass those of their male peers. For example, in Swaziland, four times as many females ages 15-24 are infected compared to their male counterparts.

Meeting attendees said factors that contribute to gender inequality -- including gender-based violence, unequal access to resources, and cultural gender norms -- all play a role in greater infection risk and fewer treatment options for women. The disease must be put in a regional and cultural context before strategies to combat it are devised, they said.

Increasing access to contraception is one less-explored option. A 2007 study by Family Health International found that while antiretrovirals prevented 101,000 pediatric HIV cases over seven years, contraception prevented the births of 173,000 HIV-positive babies each year.

While all three countries studied have policies that express the need to address the gender-HIV/AIDS link, the report characterized them as "high-level rhetoric with few objectives or actions and little follow-through." Specific recommendations were made for each donor, though a common thread was the need for greater collaboration with country stakeholders.

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