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Gender violence and HIV infection among women are interrelated with the prevalent inequality in society as is increasingly becoming evident, reports Ranjita Biswas
Though the International Fortnight Protesting Violence against Women (beginning November 25) and the World AIDS Day on December 1 happen around the same time, at first glance they do not seem have anything in common. But listen to the stories of women afflicted with HIV and you will know that the violence and discrimination against women runs across all areas, including healthcare. According to the latest report by Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and the World Health Organisation (WHO), half of all infections worldwide today are among women, particularly young women, who in many parts of the world remain powerless to control their own sexual lives in the face of violence and lack of protection of basic human rights. International agencies agree that "gender based violence is one of the leading factors in the increased rates of HIV infection among women."
Feminisation of HIV/AIDS has particular relevance to countries in the Asia Pacific with societies nursing deeply ingrained bias against women. In India, people talk about how even married women into monogamous relationships get infected because their husbands practise unsafe sex and then they get thrown out from their homes. But it was an eye-opener to encounter women from the Asia Pacific region repeating the same stories, sometimes even more horrific, at the recent ICAAP (International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific) held in Colombo.
Take for example, Maura Mea of Papua New Guinea (PNG), a nurse by profession and the first person in the island country to reveal her HIV positive status. "I was married at 22. After six months of marriage I was diagnosed as HIV infected. I was mercilessly beaten up at the slightest pretext by my husband blaming me because I was diagnosed first though he was the one who indulged in sex with multiple partners. I was abused if I worked late and was even locked up . I even lost two children."
Papua New Guinea is today emerging as one of the highest HIV occurrence countries of married women infection. Annameree O’Keeffe of AusAID, former journalist and an AIDS activist, describes the situation there as "shocking. About women in such vulnerable position, she reiterates, "It has everything to do with women, their status. Unless gender equality is ensured, the situation can only get worse."
According to an Amnesty International report (2006) "Violence against women is endemic in PNG: it affects the majority of women and girls in some parts of the country." High levels of sexual violence against women aggravates their risk of being infected with HIV, it says. The social acceptability of violence against women has been identified as one of the main factors contributing to the spread of HIV/AIDS.
A UN report last year also says that in a survey 67 per cent of the women interviewed said they had experienced abuse of some kind or the other. Gang rapes, knife attacks on wives, beating and sexual abuse of girls and torture and murder of female "sorcerers" are among the many forms of violence against women in the country.
Traditional practices and attitude heavily tilted against women have added to the prevalence of diseases like HIV, STI (sexually transmitted infection) among women. One such problem is the socially condoned practices in the region like "Line-up" or gang-rape. Men are supposed to establish their masculinity by participating in these activities. Sometimes older members through peer pressure force young males to ‘line-up.’ Wives have no control over their husbands’ behaviour or able to insist on condom use. Ironically, social custom also includes paying a "bride-price" to the girl’s father but that does not mean the woman has more voice after marriage. The powerful has more money and can afford to ‘buy’ more wives and abuse them at will. In a way both the father and the husband use the woman as a commodity.
Mea was almost on deathbed when she was contacted by Susan Paxton, adviser to the Asia Pacific Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS, who took her to a hospital for treatment . Later Mea participated in workshops organised by Paxton in Bali for women like her and today her strong voice as an activist has inspired many women to come out and seek treatment. Paxton, who carried the Olympic torch in Sydney in one lap , an assertion of her HIV status, reiterates, "Empowering women with HIV is a major thrust in our programmes. Mea is one of the best examples how one can do it."
The situation is no better for women in other Pacific islands like the Solomon Islands, Samoa, Fiji, etc. In Solomon Island, another survey found that 55 per cent women participants had been raped and 60 per cent men interviewed admitted that they took part in gang-rapes. In Fiji, a WHO, 2005, study found that 66 per cent of women interviewed said they were abused physically.
AIDS activists and caregivers are thus trying to change social attitude and particularly involve males in their programmes. "A change of attitude among men will go a long way in abating the violence and helping curb HIV infection," Mea said at the Colombo conference. Which is equally true of the scenario back home in our country.
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