From: barnhart@gagme.chi.il.us (Mr. Aaron Barnhart)
Subject: IPS: HEALTH: AIDS AWARENESS CAMPAIGN MUST INVOLVE WOMEN, SAY EXPERTS
Originator: barnhart@gagme
Organization: Evanston, Illinois, U.S.A.
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 05:46:55 GMT

Copyright Inter Press Service 1992, all rights reserved.  Permission to re-
print within 7 days of original date only with permission from 'newsdesk'.

Reference: Women
Title: HEALTH: AIDS AWARENESS CAMPAIGN MUST INVOLVE WOMEN, SAY EXPERTS


new delhi, nov 10 (ips/ranjan roy) -- aids has often been
described as an ''equal opportunity disease'' but more and more
experts are veering to the view that women are the most
defenceless victims.

''hiv mirrors the true status of women in society today,''
says nalini singh, chairing the session on women at the second
international congress on aids in asia and the pacific.

the four-day conference, which began monday, is being
organised by the aids society for asia and the pacific (asap) and
the indian government with assistance from the united nations
development programme (undp) and the world health organisation.

with almost four females in every ten hiv-positive and aids
victims, women are the fastest growing group infected by the
killer virus and yet have little control over the only known way
to prevent its spread -- the use of condoms.

estimates show that women are 8 to 10 times higher on the risk
scale not just because they cannot insist on safe sex in the
region's male-dominated societies, but because they undergo more
blood transfusions during pregnancy-related diseases, child-birth
and anaemia, common among women in the developing world.

but what experts and health activists cannot agree on is
whether the way out is through ''empowerment of women'' or
targetting men in the aids-awareness campaigns.

''the way out is empowerment. women have to overcome their
fear of violence and economic and social dependence,'' says gita
gupta rao of the international centre for research on women,
washington, d.c.

she feels that barriers to adopting low-risk methods of sex
are the same globally. ''lack of partner communication is common
and all over the world women who discuss sex are branded as being
forward.''

a study in south india have shown that while women admit their
preference to the use of condoms, barely four percent of couples
have been found to be using them regularly.

singh feels with more and more men migrating out of villages
to find work or travelling out, the wives face greater risk of
contracting hiv from their spouses.

while the message of 'empowerment' won the day inside the
conference hall, a delegate who has been through it all felt that
it is men who have to be changed. (more/ips)

cnn262

health: aids (2)

dianne lloyd from perth, australia, the only hiv-positive
woman among the 2,000-odd delegates is bitter about not being
invited to speak at the session on 'aids: changing reality for
women.'

lloyd, who discovered six years ago that she was carrying the
virus, charges conference sponsors of the same societal biases
they are criticising.

''the 11 hiv-positive people at the conference have been
denied a voice,'' she alleges pointing out that the only session
they were slated to speak was slashed to just an hour.

''it is the men who have to change their attitudes about aids,
women's diseases and how to deal with them in a relationship,''
she says, warning it is ''easy to talk of empowerment'' but it
will have little effect.

''even in a society considered modern and liberal women find
it difficult to insist that their sexual partners use condoms,''
lloyd adds.

there were others who felt that being modern and educated had
little impact on attitudes towards safe sex. two sex workers
invited as delegates to the congress said they found ''educated
clients the hardest to convince about condom usage.''

exposed to the awareness programmes, these women who
constitute a 'high-risk' group are resorting to what they
describe as ''devious'' ways to enforce the safe sex norm.

''clients in my brothel are made to pay in advance and then we
tell them that they have to use the condom and there is no
refund,'' says one of the women who asked not to be identified.
(end/ips/hm/rr/an/92)