South African HIV Women Suffer Under Inequality

WNN Features – WNN Report / Amnesty International

AIDS poster

Violence and extreme poverty in rural South Africa place women at grave risk of becoming infected with HIV, according to a new report by Amnesty International. This undermines the ability of women who are HIV positive to seek and obtain treatment, thus worsening a national epidemic that is one of the worst in the world.

The 124-page report, based on interviews with rural women living with HIV, describes oppressive relationships with male partners, economic marginalization and severe inequalities.

“Rural women in South Africa are disproportionately affected by poverty and unemployment,” said Mary Rayner, Amnesty International’s South Africa researcher and author of the report titled “I Am At the Lowest End Of All.”

“They continue to experience discrimatory attitudes and practices — particularly from male partners and live in an environment rife with high levels of sexual and other gender-based violence.”

The South African government has gradually improved its response to the HIV epidemic through the adoption of the Department of Health’s widely-welcomed five-year plan to combat AIDS, HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases. Still, 5.5 million South Africans are HIV-infected (about 10 percent of the population), one of the highest prevalence rates in the world. Fifty-five percent of those infected are women. South African women under 25 are three to four times more likely to be HIV-infected than men in the same age group.

The report offers specific recommendations to the South African government to address the urgent needs of women with HIV in rural areas. The report calls on the government to urgently intensify efforts to prevent violence against women through stepped up policing and prosecution, and to address the economic inequalities that block HIV and AIDS prevention, treatment and care. Additionally, the report urges the government to widen access to health services for women in rural areas, and help them with the consequences of HIV, including safety concerns, when disclosing their status to male partners.

Many women interviewed by Amnesty International in South Africa said they were often unable to protect themselves against HIV infection because they felt at risk of violence from male partners when they suggested condom use.

One woman told Amnesty International that her husband, a truck driver, spent much of his time on the road. On his days off, he visited her but refused to use condoms when she asked him to do so. After he abandoned the family she became sick, and discovered at the local clinic that she was HIV positive.

Several other women interviewed by Amnesty International described being beaten and forced to have sex by husbands who refused to use condoms.

“Women’s lives in rural South Africa are scarred by persistent violence in their families, homes and in under-policed, unsafe communities,” said Michelle Kagari, Deputy Director of Amnesty International – Africa.