Why we need to learn from others

Nicole Gooch
Susie Wahasoka is no stranger to the art of euphemism in her job as Peer to Peer Support Project Officer with Papua New Guinea’s Save the Children.

Wahasoka is an advocate for female sex workers—a taboo topic for many Pacific Islanders.

“Sex workers are stigmatised and marginalised by prohibitive laws so they have little access to information on safe sex or prevention and treatment of sexually transmissible infections (STIs). Yet most of them are women who have no other choices.

They may be widows with no land, or else they are being ignored by their husbands and have no money to feed their children.

Or they may have escaped family abuse by running away, have little education and no other employment opportunities,” says Wahasoka.

In August this year, she was one of about 30 Pacific representatives at the 16th International AIDS Conference in Toronto.

This largest ever AIDS conference was attended by more than 25,000 people from political and religious leaders, scientists and representatives of the police and armed forces to AIDS activists, celebrities and journalists.

A strong message at the AIDS conference was that women are increasingly vulnerable to HIV and that young women between the ages of 15 and 24 are more than twice as likely as men to become infected.

In the Pacific, as in Africa, gender inequality frequently underlies the spread of HIV.

Social and cultural norms mean women often lack enough power in a relationship to negotiate for safe sex and must also carry the burden of caring for other sick family members. Nevertheless, they are usually the ones blamed for introducing HIV into a family and may be abandoned by their in-laws.

Ratu Epeli Nailatikau, Fiji’s retired House of Representatives Speaker and now UNAIDS Special Representative to the Pacific, spoke at a conference session on holding parliamentarians accountable for their response to HIV.

For Nailatikau, the fight against HIV cuts across many areas. “HIV is a not only a health issue but also an economic, national security and social issue.

“Barriers such as social stigma will always be there. But we must find ways to get around these. We need to update our legislation, for instance, but also to keep talking about these issues openly.

“National leaders need to be at the forefront of the fight. We cannot make statements once a month and then leave it and we cannot do it from a distance.

“Politicians and community leaders need to be seen to be involved and need to act now,” said Nailatikau.

“It should be a matter of pride for every country to abandon their complacency and look seriously at the catastrophic impact an HIV epidemic could have on their population.”

The momentum generated by the international AIDS conference will not be lost in the Pacific, with representatives from the region returning full of renewed energy and motivation after sharing their experiences and listening to others from all over the world.

For SPC, the conference was a reminder that the Pacific region can still learn from successes and failures in other regions, but that this opportunity will not last.

Although HIV prevalence in the region is low except in Papua New Guinea, a recent SPC survey showed that sexually transmitted infections and high-risk sexual behaviours were common in the six countries surveyed—Fiji, Kiribati, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga and Vanuatu. The average rate of chlamydia was as high as 29% in one country. When left untreated, chlamydia can increase the risk of becoming infected with HIV.

“The experiences of other regions underlines for Pacific states the social devastation that waits around the corner if we don’t take action now to help people already living with HIV and address vulnerability to infection,” says Dr Gary Rogers, deputy section head of SPC’s HIV & STI section.

Twenty-five years after the first case of AIDS was diagnosed in the United States, an estimated 38.6 million people worldwide are living with HIV (UNAIDS 2006 report on the global AIDS epidemic).

There is evidence that the stable or falling incidence seen in some countries is related to effective behavioural change and prevention programmes. But despite this encouraging trend, several countries are experiencing an increasing rate of new HIV infections.

Rogers says, “SPC’s HIV & STI section is supporting efforts by Pacific countries and territories to roll out life-saving treatment, create an environment where people can safely come forward for testing to benefit from that treatment, and put in place prevention strategies that respect the rights of people who are vulnerable to getting HIV.

“We’re forming strong partnerships for action with Pacific states and learning from the experiences of other countries in dealing with HIV. “Failing to take effective action now will have profound social consequences for this part of the world.”