Violence linked to HIV risk

Women whose partners are violent and domineering have a 50 percent increased risk of being infected with HIV, which causes AIDS, scientists say.

Women whose partners are violent and domineering have a 50 percent increased risk of being infected with HIV, which causes AIDS, scientists say.In the first study to assess the impact of gender-based violence as a risk factor for HIV/AIDS in South Africa, researchers found that womenin abusive relationships are more likely to be infected with the deadly virus.”Women with violent or controlling male partners are at an increased risk of HIV,” Dr Rachel Jewkes, of the Medical Research Council inPretoria, said in a report in The Lancet medical journal on Friday.Half of the 40 million people worldwide living with HIV/AIDS, which killed three million people last year, are women.Jewkes and her team interviewed 1,366 pregnant South African women at four clinics in Soweto about their partner, their sexual behaviourand violence in their relationship. The women were also tested for HIV.More than one in five pregnant women are infected with HIV in most countries in southern Africa, according to UNAIDS, the UN agencyleading the global battle against HIV/AIDS.In South Africa the figure is between 22-25 percent.The researchers found that women who had been physically abused or whose partner had excessive control in the relationship had a 50percent higher rate of HIV infection than other women.AIDS experts promote the ABCs — Abstinence, Being faithful and Condom use — to prevent HIV infection but it will have little impact ifwomen are forced to have sex.”These ABCs presume that one has a certain level of control over one’s own behaviour and one’s partner’s behaviour and if that is acomplete fallacy, as it is for many women, you need to start thinking very differently about how you intervene,” said Dr Kristin Dunkle, aco-author of the report from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.Fifty-five percent of the women questioned in the study reported being physically or sexually assaulted by a male partner. More than 30percent had been assaulted within the last 12 months and one in five had been assaulted more than once within the last year.”Just that prevalence figure is something people need to think about in terms of HIV counselling and testing services,” Dunkle added in aninterview.(Source: Reuters Health News, April 2004)