Widows
without Rights Conference
London - 6-7 February,
2001
WIDOWS
and AIDS:
redefinitions and challenges
A presentation by
Bridget Sleap
Panos AIDS
Programme
One
of the major problems facing widows is the fact that they
are so often seen as little more than victims. Widows, whether
or not they have HIV, may have much to offer society, including
skills that may not have been utilised during marriage.
An
increasing number of organisations that are working with widows,
for example introducing income generating schemes, or encouraging
widows to keep family history books for their children, but
many widows may be unable to access these support groups.
This
year's world AIDS campaign focuses on men and AIDS. NGOs,
policy makers and international agencies are finally beginning
to address the role that men play in driving the epidemic.
Since changing sexual behaviour is at the heart of reducing
the spread of HIV, and since in the majority of countries
men have control over this behaviour, this approach could
be seen as a pragmatic realisation of the limits on women's
ability to change existing power relations. However, present
interventions that focus on men are not really confronting
the causes of male social, political and economic power and
the consequent vulnerability of women and widows that is at
the heart of the spread of HIV. Pragmatic short term programmes
must be matched by long term social change if both the spread
of HIV is to be reduced and the rights of women and widows
respected.
There
is a need to ensure that interventions that target widows
do not merely add to their existing roles as carers, mothers
and providers but see them as women in their own right. There
are fears that highlighting a group within the epidemic increases
the stigma and discrimination that they suffer. However, if
policymakers, NGOs and the media continue to fail to address
the causes behind the particular vulnerability of widows,
they continue to discriminate against them and fail to recognise
the changes that HIV/AIDS is dictating.
-
-
Personal correspondence with Dominique De Santis, Press
Officer, UNAIDS, 21st November 2000, on file with author.
-
UNAIDS
June 2000 Report on the global HIV/AIDS epidemic.
-
Charlene
Smith, Women Carry The Burden, Mail and Guardian World AIDS
Day Supplement, 1st December 2000, p5
-
Carolyn
Baylies and Janet Burjira, Sexuality and Gender in Africa,
Routledge, London, 2000, p 11.
-
Gender-AIDS
582, 27th October 1999.
-
UNAIDS
June 2000 Report on the global HIV/AIDS epidemic. p 43
-
UNAIDS
and WHO, AIDS Epidemic Update: December 2000, UNAIDS, Geneva,
2000, p 14.
-
Carolyn
Baylies and Janet Burjira, Sexuality and Gender in Africa,
Routledge, London, 2000, p12.
-
UNIFEM
Panel Addresses the Myths, Rituals and Practices of Widowhood,
Including the Implications of HIV/AIDS, Press Release, 30
May 2000, [online] URL < http://unifem.undp.org/madvisor/ma_widow.html
> Visited 24/08/00
-
Beatrice
Newby, Mourning Sickness, Orbit, 1999, 73, p 22.
-
Carolyn
Baylies and Janet Burjira, Sexuality and Gender in Africa,
Routledge, London, 2000, p 11.
-
Gender-AIDS
729, op. cit.
-
Carolyn
Baylies and Janet Burjira, Sexuality and Gender in Africa,
Routledge, London, 2000, p xiii.
-
Carolyn
Baylies and Janet Burjira, Sexuality and Gender in Africa,
Routledge, London, 2000, p 71.
-
UNAIDS,
AIDS Epidemic Update: December 2000, UNAIDS, Geneva, December
2000, p 13.
-
Stella
Neema, Afflicted and Affected: Consequences of HIV/AIDS
on Women in A Farming Community in Uganda, in Gladys Mutanga
et al eds. AIDS and Africa Smallholder Agriculture, SAfAIDS,
Harare, 1999, p 73.
-
Soori
Nnko et al, Tanzania: AIDS Care - Learning from Experience,
Review of African Political Economy, 86, 2000, p552.
-
Mark
Schoofs, Death and The Second Sex, Village Voice, December
1-7 1999, [online] URL <http://www.thebody.com/schoofs/africa5.html
> Visited…….
-
Rangarirai
Shoko, Spouse Inheritance Continues in Zimbabwe Despite
AIDS, Panafrica News Agency, 24 January 2001, [online] URL
<http://www.allafrica.com/stories/printable/20010122440258.html
> Visited 25 January 2001.
-
Carolyn
Baylies and Janet Burjira, Sexuality and Gender in Africa,
Routledge, London, 2000, p 182.
-
AF-AIDS
430, 28th September 1999, [email protected]
Janet Bujra, Targeting Men for a Change, Agenda, 44, 2000,
p.15.
-
Carolyn
Baylies and Janet Burjira, Sexuality and Gender in Africa,
Routledge, London, 2000, p 182.
-
Stella
Neema, Afflicted and Affected: Consequences of HIV/AIDS
on Women in A Farming Community in Uganda, in Gladys Mutanga
et al eds. AIDS and Africa Smallholder Agriculture, SAfAIDS,
Harare, 1999, p 72.
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