HIV/AIDS and Women





Nearly 50% of those living with the virus are women (see chart 1). In sub-Saharan Africa, more than twice as many women as men are living with HIV.

A woman’s vulnerability to the virus is attributable not only to biological differences, but also to deeply entrenched socio-economic inequalities that further compound susceptibility. This includes economic vulnerability leading to transactional sex, forced or coerced sex and the inability to negotiate condom use. As young women and girls are even more biologically and socially vulnerable to HIV/AIDS than older women, a marked increase in their infection rates has occurred — far surpassing those of young men in some countries.

HIV-positive women are also at high risk of transmitting HIV to their children during pregnancy or childbirth or through breastfeeding. Today, mother-to-child transmission (MTCT) is the primary mode of HIV acquisition in children, and 25-35% of children born to HIV positive women in low-income settings will contract the disease in utero, during delivery or through breastfeeding.

While an inexpensive single dose of antiretroviral therapy (ART) costing only about US$1 can reduce the risk of MTCT of HIV by half, more than 2 million children under the age of 15 today are living with HIV, most having acquired it through their mothers. ART is presently available to only about 1% of women who need it. In addition, many thousands of pregnant women do not know their HIV status, do not have access to voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) to learn of their status, or forgo testing or taking the drug for fear of violence from their partners or stigmatization from their communities. Women must be able to access VCT and ART with full protection of their rights to privacy and confidentiality.

As AIDS ravages families and communities, the burden of caring for ill family members rests mainly with women and girls — many of whom may be seriously ill themselves. Women comprise 70% of the world’s poor. A woman affected by HIV/AIDS is plunged further into poverty, losing the ability to provide for herself and her children. Through pervasive social stigma and the collapse of traditional family and support structures, HIV/AIDS is eroding the already precarious social and economic status of women in many countries.