hiv / aids: what policy for life?

A disease of homosexuals, junkies, minorities; the myths surrounding HIV are parasitic, feeding off the vulnerability of those who have already been consigned to the margins of society. They are woven into a fictitious world where the sick and healthy are discrete and identifiable categories, and where membership in each is determined arbitrarily by race, sexual orientation, and gender.

They are the myths that the Sophia Forum is seeking to dismantle. Initiated in 2005, the Forum is a voluntary women's network based in UK exploring how HIV affects women at home and abroad. In its panel discussion on October 1^st entitled "In Sickness and In Health: Women and HIV in 2009", the Sophia Forum drew attention to the acute need for gender specificity in understanding a condition that effects not merely homosexuals or the "socially marginal", but an estimated 30,000 women in the UK every year.

A disease of homosexuals, junkies, minorities; the myths surrounding HIV are parasitic, feeding off the vulnerability of those who have already been consigned to the margins of society. They are woven into a fictitious world where the sick and healthy are discrete and identifiable categories, and where membership in each is determined arbitrarily by race, sexual orientation, and gender.

They are the myths that the Sophia Forum is seeking to dismantle. Initiated in 2 5, the Forum is a voluntary women's network based in UK exploring how HIV affects women at home and abroad. In its panel discussion on October 1^st entitled "In Sickness and In Health: Women and HIV in 2 9", the Sophia Forum drew attention to the acute need for gender specificity in understanding a condition that effects not merely homosexuals or the "socially marginal", but an estimated 3 , women in the UK every year.

After a decade of participating in civil society organizing around the Commission on the Status of Women, I came to this year's meetings to observe.   It's an exciting moment for those of us who have worked for so many years to link the women's movement with the HIV and AIDS movement.  For the first time, a central aspect of HIV and AIDS affecting women - the burden of care - is an explicit focus of the Commission on the Status of Women.