PlusNews Web Special - Gender and HIV/AIDS

PlusNews, IRIN's HIV/AIDS news service, has launched a new Web Special to mark International Women's Day on 8 March 2004. A series of features from Angola, Swaziland and Zambia examines the connection between gender and HIV/AIDS. The Web Special also links to a campaign by the UN's Regional Inter-Agency Coordination Support Office for the Special Envoy for Humanitarian Needs in Southern Africa, which explores the region's humanitarian crisis "Through the Eyes of Women". Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary-General, has highlighted the connection between women's empowerment and the global response to HIV/AIDS. "As AIDS strikes at the lifeline of society that women represent, a vicious cycle develops. Poor women are becoming even less economically secure as a result of AIDS, often deprived of rights to housing, property or inheritance, or even adequate health services. In rural areas, AIDS has caused the collapse of coping systems that for centuries have helped women to feed their families during times of drought and famine - leading in turn to family break-ups, migration, and yet greater risk of HIV infection," Annan said in a statement to mark this year's International Women's Day. "As AIDS forces girls to drop out of school - whether they are forced to take care of a sick relative, run the household, or help support the family - they fall deeper into poverty. Their own children in turn are less likely to attend school - and more likely to become infected. Thus, society pays many times over the deadly price of the impact on women of AIDS," he added. The Web Special can be viewed at: www.plusnews.org