15/04/2010
SAfAIDS Conference on "The HIV/Culture Confluence: Changing the River's Flow - Possibilities and Challenges"
The South Africa HIV and AIDS Dissemination Service (SAfAIDS) hosted a conference on "The HIV/Culture Confluence: Changing the River's Flow - Possibilities and Challenges", 12-13 April in Johannesburg.
Theme of the Conference:
Southern African is home to the highest HIV infection rates globally, and simultaneously has some of the world's highest rates of violence against women (VAW). Studies commissioned in Namibia and Mozambique confirmed that despite all the progress made in advancing women's rights and in fighting the twin epidemics of HIV and VAW, the patriarchal nature of societies in Africa are supported by deep-seated cultural beliefs and practices and continue to undermine effort to achieve a decline in the incidence of HIV in the region.
The regional conference focused on the following themes:
1. Achieving community participation for HIV and GBV prevention, placing cultural leadership at the fore
2. Our children and our culture, investing in the next generation to curb incidences of GBV, HIV and AIDS
3. Government leadership in HIV policy
4. Working with policy makers towards achieving policy and legal reforms: opportunities and experiences of community dialogue approach around GBV, women's rights and HIV prevention in rural, peri-urban and urban communities in southern Africa.
Culture and HIV prevention:
The conference was opened by Mr. Sandi Mbatsha, Special Advisor to the Minister of Women, Youth and People with Disabilities in the Republic of South Africa. Mr Mbatsha highlighted the importance of exploring the relationship between culture and HIV incidence. He applauded the revision and revival of certain traditional cultural practices, namely male circumcision, as a means to curb new infections.
However, he simultaneously expressed concern over the misuse of other cultural traditions, stating that positive cultural practices, if badly adapted, become harmful and may contribute to the incidence of HIV. In particular, he highlighted the practice of ukuthwala, or the forced marriage of young girls, typically occurring in rural areas of the Eastern Cape. He cites several harmful adaptations – involving minors, targeting HIV negative virgins and abducting and marrying virgins as a means of sexually cleansing HIV positive men – which increased exposure of young women to HIV. Mr Mbatsha revealed that government is working with traditional authorities in these areas to highlight the harmful nature of these practices.
Crucially, Mr Mbatsha stated that these practices constitute violence against women and a contravention of their rights, which cannot be hidden behind claims of ‘culture’.
For more information on the conference, please visit the sites below.
References
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