This report, a joint document from ActionAid
and the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), draws attention to
the knowledge, institutional capacity, and resources needed to address the
intersection between HIV and AIDS and violence against women and girls (VAWG).
Its aim is to stimulate debate and collaboration among practitioners and
advocates about how to identify and promote effective prevention policies and
practices that can be adapted to various contexts.
Recognising that violence
against women and HIV and AIDS are mutually reinforcing pandemics, this report
highlights key elements to consider in strategies addressing their intersection
"by profiling organizations that employ human rights and gender-sensitive
approaches to the dual pandemics; that empower marginalized sectors of society;
that promote community ownership; that build the capacity of civil society;
that encourage cross-sectoral integration; and that facilitate linkages between
advocates and activists within the HIV&AIDS and VAWG movements." The
four broad-based strategies for tackling the intersection are: community
mobilisation to transform harmful gender norms; engagement of marginalised
groups that are often more vulnerable to the twin pandemics; development of
integrated approaches to support and care; and advocacy for greater
accountability among funding agencies and policy makers.
- The
first strategic approach - involving community groups to change harmful
gender norms - profiles Sonke Gender Justice from South Africa, India’s MILANA, and Equal Access Nepal. For example, by emphasising the proactive roles of
all community members in ending the pandemics, these organisations foster
communities in which violence is not tolerated, and women and girls living
with HIVandAIDS are supported to live safe, productive lives. "By
working with a range of actors whose attitudes and behaviours help shape
societal norms, [Sonke Gender Justice] encourage[s] community ownership
and buy-in from even the most sceptical of stakeholders...and demonstrate[s]
that the intersection of violence and HIV is more than just a 'woman’s
issue'....[B]y probing deeply held cultural beliefs, ...[they] promote a
more inclusive understanding of local culture to create true communities
of support." Community involvement can include men, local governments
and traditional leaders, provincial and national government leaders, and,
as in the case of MILANA, a support network of women living with
HIV&AIDS and their families. It can involve interpersonal meetings
and, as in the case of Equal Access Nepal, radio broadcast and community
discussion, training of both genders, and gathering and making available
personal testimonies through broadcast, print, and personal presentation.
- The
second approach - focusing on vulnerability rooted not only in gender
inequalities, but in social disparities based on race, class, ethnicity,
age, sexual orientation and other factors - highlights Brazil’s Criola,
Women of Color United USA (WOCU), and Nigeria’s Girls Power Initiative (GPI).
The strategy of these examples is to tackle the multiple forms of
marginalisation that make women and girls vulnerable both to violence and
HIV and AIDS. Criola develops tools to help women and girls deal with
violence, raise their self-esteem, advocate for their rights, and embrace
their Afro-Brazilian heritage and takes the tools into neighbourhoods of
marginalised women and girls. WOCU works to raise awareness of the link
between race, gender, and HIV status in the United States (US) through a
network of organisations that collects data, advocates for more
quantitative research, and holds policy makers accountable. GPI uses
education to teach girls how to negotiate respectful relationships and
protect themselves from unsafe sex.
- The
third strategy - using health care as an entry point to comprehensively
address the two pandemics - highlights Nairobi Women’s Hospital and the
Fundación para Estudio e Investigación de la Mujer (FEIM). The hospital in
Nairobi includes the Gender Violence Recovery Centre (GVRC) where women
receive treatment, counselling, testing, and referrals for longer-term
care, such as free anti-retroviral (ARV) therapy. Psychosocial support
includes follow-up counselling and possible shelter and legal action
services. In Argentina, FEIM created a protocol to specifically address
linkages between violence and HIV&AIDS in healthcare and worked with
the city’s Ministry of Health and the Chief of the Ministry’s HIV Unit to
put pressure on hospitals to implement new gender-friendly policies, as
well as to dispel the stigma and discrimination surrounding HIV status.
Comprehensive care now includes psychological and legal services, as well
as extensive follow-up by medical personnel.
- The
last strategy - holding policy makers accountable for their efforts to
address the linkages between the pandemics - highlights the global Women
Won’t Wait (WWW) campaign and The Civil Resource, Development and
Documentation Centre (CIRDDOC), of Nigeria, which promote gender-sensitive
HIV and AIDS policies at all levels of decision-making and push for
adequate funding and participation of women’s organisations in the design
and implementation of programmes to address the intersection of VAWG and
HIV&AIDS. WWW published a gender-based analysis of the international AIDS
response. They mobilised the public and brought together the two civil
society movements working on HIV and VAGW, bringing activists from
different backgrounds together who share common goals. CIRDDOC established
15 community information centres in rural Nigeria equipped with
generators, televisions, and video players to access news and legal
information, legal services, and support. A team of paralegals,
development information officers, and civic educators works with women to
demystify and simplify the law, including step-by-step guidelines to
access legal services. Civic educators further explore issues around
gender, violence, and HIV&AIDS through workshops and community forums.
Once a year, the Centre holds public tribunals for women to speak out against
the abuses they have suffered, and to raise awareness around violence,
HIV, and larger issues of sexual and reproductive rights. The audience of
several hundred members includes government officials and legislators.
CIRDDOC also offers trainings to legal and health workers, increasing
their empathy by putting them in the place of the women with whom they
work, and employees the Mutapola Framework, a rights-based approach
putting women at the centre of the HIV and AIDS response.
The five concluding recommendations
are the following:
1.
More research is necessary to identify and evaluate effective
strategies for addressing the intersection between HIV an d AIDS and VAWG, and
to document the lessons learned.
2.
National and global data on violence against women and girls and
HIV and AIDS should be collected and disseminated as a means of holding policy
makers accountable.
3.
Standardised protocols and training for health care personnel are
necessary to guide them on the connections between VAWG and HIV and AIDS.
4.
Efforts must be made to engage excluded communities in the places
where they live, work and play.
5.
Community buy-in from a range of stakeholders is needed to address
stigma and discrimination associated with VAWG and HIV and AIDS.