November 2006, id21 insights, Issue #64

Dealing with HIV and AIDS

Solutions in ordinary people's actions

Twenty-five years of knowingly living with HIV, the global community is still falling behind the virus in its alarming, complex and often hidden progress. Despite many diverse and creative successes in committed peoples' responses and many lessons drawn along the way, few have been widely adopted. What can we learn from this diversity of response?

Other articles in this issue:

Talking freely about sexuality in Zambia

Various factors make young people vulnerable to HIV/AIDS: earlier puberty and later marriage, sexual and gender norms, sexual abuse, poverty, mixed messages about sexual behaviour and lack of condoms. Schools and communities in Zambia work together to build knowledge, values and skills and create positive peer pressure to help young people.

Can a workshop change stigma?

Irrational fears and judgements, misinformation and traditional beliefs fuel stigma against people living with HIV and AIDS. Although policy change and advocacy are important for creating an environment free of stigma, individual behaviour change is equally important.

Managing masculinity in Ecuador

A project in rural Ecuador worked with a youth group to reduce gender-based power imbalances. Drawings, role plays and focus group discussions helped group members cope with complex issues in innovative and transformative ways.

Life and dignity: standing up against homophobia

Octavio Acuña a soft-spoken gay man who worked for AQUESEX - a non-governmental organisation in Mexico, was murdered in 2005.

Sex workers have rights too

Women sex workers have faced the worst of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in India. Although they suffer high levels of HIV infection, some programmes contribute to the stigma sex workers carry, by labelling them core transmitters of infection. Others programmes typically regard sex workers as victims with little ability to change anything.

HIV positive men as responsible citizens and patients

South Africa's national anti-retroviral therapy programme and the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) have been at the forefront in fighting HIV/AIDS. Rolling out anti-retrovirals nationally and ensuring treatment adherence is far from easy, however. HIV positive people can help themselves and others by being responsible citizens.

Rural Uganda making sense of HIV/AIDS

1989: Rakai District, Uganda. Gwanda is a small isolated village, a beautiful place close to Tanzania near Lake Victoria but with a sad reputation. It is situated in the epicentre of the AIDS epidemic and of the war, when the Tanzanian troops came to overthrow Idi Amin.

Global communities respond to HIV/AIDS

When international AIDS donors agreed in 1994 that 'greater involvement of people with HIV and AIDS' (GIPA) was a good policy, they did not expect its impact to be so far-reaching. Twelve years later, GIPA is much more than a policy. It has generated a transnational therapeutic movement and new forms of community.

Community and faith-based groups lend a hand

Several households falling into poverty as a result of HIV/AIDS desperately need support systems. African communities have modified existing safety net mechanisms and pioneered new responses such as home-based care programmes, support groups and orphans and vulnerable children initiatives. But how long can self-resourced initiatives continue to function?

Preventing intimate partner violence and HIV

For women who face physical or sexual violence from a partner, refusing sex, insisting on fidelity or condom-use are not realistic options. Even if women change their own risk behaviour, they are at increased risk of HIV infection.

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