Women have been named and claimed by all major players moving towards a solution in the AIDS crisis. Wonderful, but we women living with HIV gathered here in Barcelona are still frustrated. Where is the plenary presentation which highlights our experiences, skills and yes our own analysis of the epidemic and our increasing vulnerability?
On Tuesday in a small, self-organised satellite at the Mujeres Adelante site, the International Community of Women Living with HIV/AIDS (ICW) presented the findings from a research/advocacy project, designed and implemented by HIV positive women in collaboration with academic institutions in Zimbabwe and Thailand. Positive Women Voices and Choices explores the impact of HIV on women’s sexual behaviour, well-being and reproductive rights.
This innovative project empowers positive women to speak out with confidence and to voice the issues of concern to them. It reflects their hopes, fears and visions for the future. The project reflects the immense need for a paradigm shift in research methodologies. It shows how positive women are finally beginning to take our rightful place as central actors in our own research processes, building on our real, lived experiences to determine our needs, rights and aspěrations for ourselves, our loved ones and our future world without AIDS.
As Professor Robert Chambers reflected on Sunday, “positive people have for far too long been viewed as sinners, then as victims, next as acronyms – now they are starting to be recognised as real people and they really need to be valued as central actors in the whole response.” ICW resoundingly endorses this sentiment and calls on other donors, researchers and service providers to follow suit.
Many thanks to donors who have understood and embraced this paradigm shift, such as the Ford Foundation, Comic Relief, NORAD, WHO and UNAIDS.
(Copies of the "Zimbabwe Voices and Choices" report are available from ICW, SafAIDS and Healthlink Worldwide in the NGO area.)
AIDS 2002 Conference News produced by Health & Development Networks/Key Correspondent Team