AIDS and its effects on the advancement of women
Women 2000 1989(1): 1-16
1989
PMID: 12342539 Document Number: 383999
This document gives an overview of the worldwide spread of acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS), the means of its prevention, and its effects on women who are not infected. It also explains how the AIDS virus is not spread, and why it is important not to be afraid of those infected with the AIDS virus. It stresses the need for information at a time when a vaccine or cure are not yet available, and education is the only means of prevention. The global mobilization being conducted to fight the AIDS crisis is discussed. Different ways in which women are at risk to infection by the HIV virus are reviewed, especially the subordination of women. This denies them the same education, legal rights, training, health, and independent incomes, all of which reduces their chance for access to information about AIDS. It considers risk of being infected by a partner, from a blood transfusion, increased susceptibility in someone who already has a sexually transmitted disease, increased susceptibility in a woman who has been circumcised, risk of infection from rape, and how women are coerced into prostitution, putting them at risk for AIDS. It also covers HIV infection and contraception, the danger to professional health-care workers, transmission of HIV infection from mother-to-infant, and discrimination that is AIDS-related. Women who are not infected are impacted by AIDS because they suffer stress as caretakers. The document also discusses the social and economic consequences of AIDS.