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CURRENTS
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Every day, 7000 women are infected with HIV. A lack of education about proper prevention techniques, domestic violence, and sexual exploitation, including the sex industry, rape, and basic gender inequalities, puts women at risk for contracting HIV. In many ways, these problems take the ability of women to protect themselves out of their own control. According to the UNAIDS Initiative: Global Coalition of Women and AIDS, 10% to 50% of women worldwide report experiencing violence by their partner at least once in their lives. Domestic violence is defined as physical, sexual, psychological, emotional, financial, or verbal abuse. In many developing nations, the majority of HIV+ women are infected by their husbands, rendering many “abstinence only” programs useless. In these societies it is common for men to engage in extramarital relations and contract and spread the disease through those relationships. When married women request that their husbands use condoms though, they face being accused of having extramarital relations themselves and having HIV, or they risk abandonment. In a study conducted by the Global Coalition on Women and AIDS, one woman interviewed reported, “We see out husbands with wives of men who have died of AIDS. What can we do? If we say no to sex, they’ll pack and go. If we do, where do we go?” Sexual violence and exploitation are other major factors in HIV infection among women. While rape is a problem faced around the world, it is an everyday phenomenon in war-torn areas, where it is used as a weapon of war. Rape occurs in refugee camps, where inhabitants live in inadequate and unsafe conditions and where a “community of silence” prevails and in prisons, where guards abuse their position of power and use it as a fear factor. Traditional beliefs and practices also contribute to high rates of sexual abuse and violence. Around the world, kidnapping, forced prostitution, and sex slavery put women in high-risk and dangerous circumstances, from which escaping is often difficult if not impossible. These women, including those who choose to enter the sex industry (due to a lack of economic opportunities, resources, or status), face ongoing violence, exposure to HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), and access to little, or no, healthcare. In South Africa, the belief that sex with a virgin can cure AIDS has men raping young girls and even babies. A survey done by the Global Coalition of Women and AIDS found that 20% to 45% of girls in South Africa aged 10 to15 described their first sexual encounter as forced. Other traditional practices, such as “wife inheritance” (when a relative of the dead husband takes the widow as his wife), “ritual sexual cleansing” (when a widow is forced to have sex with a social outcast in order to cleanse herself of her husband’s evil spirits), and the payment of a bride price (when the bride is paid for by the husband’s family and thus is a form of property), also put women at a higher risk of infection. Fighting the threat of HIV infection in women around the world is a major and multifaceted job. It requires not only education and prevention efforts, but also international policies and laws that strictly protect the basic human rights of women. A change of attitudes, beliefs, traditions, and stigmas associated with women and HIV, and a shift in the fundamental thinking about social, marital, and economic equality are also necessary.
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