With the rising incidence of women living with HIV/AIDS worldwide, the Womens Global Network for Reproductive Rights (WGNRR) is launching a Call for Action together with advocates and other international groups on May 28. The activity is part of the celebration of the International Day of Action for Womens Health. According to WGNRR, there are 7.5 million women living with HIV/AIDS worldwide, with over 3 million in Sub-Saharan Africa, and almost two million in South and Southeast Asia. The group also cited the growing prevalence rates in Eastern Europe and Central Asia since 2000, showing that the underestimated figure of 440,000 women living with HIV/AIDS in the Russian Federation as the biggest in Europe.

More prone and vulnerable

Women are biologically more prone to contracting HIV, WGNRR says in its Call for Action. They further explain that small lesions in the genital area can easily occur through sexual intercourse, and these can be entry points for the virus. And since the genital tissue is less mature in younger women, unprotected sex can put them at greater risk. Menopausal women also face increased risk since they have less natural lubrication during intercourse.

Aside from the biological make-up which make women more prone to infection, WGNRR also said that other factors contribute to make women vulnerable to HIV/AIDS. These include social, economic, political, and religious and cultural realities and customs that treat women as having less power and autonomy than men, making them less likely to negotiate for safe sex with their partners.

Womens stereotypical role as wives and mothers give them little bargaining power especially when it comes to sex. They risk psychological and physical abuse, abandonment, eviction, shunning, and being stripped of resources when they do decide to claim their sexual and reproductive health and rights.

Vulnerability can be overcome

Despite these odds, the WGNRR believes that the vulnerability of women and girls to HIV/AIDS can be overcome through government policies, laws, regulations, programmes, and practices that empower women and safeguard their human rights. They also believe that women need not wait for help, and that they can already take action to break the ties binding them to an oppressive society.

Thus, through the global Call for Action, WGNRR seeks to mobilize everyone concerned with womens health to take up activities that will put womens reproductive and sexual health and rights at the centre of the response to HIV/AIDS. The group also promotes actions that will counter womens vulnerability to the infection.

In addition to being an awareness-raising and mobilization tool, WGNRRs Call for Action is a capacity-building tool which has concrete suggestions for lobbying, advocacy, campaigning, and public actions that can be taken at the local, national, regional, and global levels. The main text covers the reasons for womens vulnerability to HIV/AIDS and what can be done about it. It also contains mini-resource guides on international agreements, and articles that can provide information to support advocacy programs.

Spread the word

WGNRR offers the texts of the Call for Action to anyone; it can be translated as needed, or adapted, reproduced, and distributed without permission. The group only asks that they be informed as to how and where this Call was used, for what purposes, and with whom. According to them, they can readily provide additional resources if needed.

The Call for Action is part of the Womens Access to Health Campaign, a joint worldwide initiative of the WGNRR and the Peoples Health Movement (PHM). To get involved, contact the Campaign Secretariat at
<This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>. Copies of the Call for Action may be downloaded from the WGNRR website: <www.wgnrr.org>.

WGNRR can be contacted at
Email: <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Phone: (+3 (0) 20.620.9672)
Fax: (+3 (0) 20.622.2450).
Mailing Address:
Womens Global Network for Reproductive Rights (WGNRR),
Vrolikstraat 453-D,
092 TJ Amsterdam,
The Netherlands.