| | |  Health & Beauty | July 2008 
HIV/AIDS Increasingly Affecting Women in Mexico, Experts Say
 Kaisernetwork.org
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Health officials and experts have said recently that HIV/AIDS is increasingly affecting women in Mexico, Xinhuanet reports.
According to Jorge Saavedra, director of the National Center for the Prevention and Control of HIV/AIDS, women account for 20% of new HIV/AIDS cases recorded in Mexico, and AIDS-related deaths among women in the country also are increasing. Saavedra added that women are more likely to contract the virus from their husbands or stable sex partners, who often are undocumented immigrants to the U.S.
Undocumented immigrants to the U.S. have been a primary source of HIV transmission for Mexican women, Manuel Yanez, professor at the Metropolitan Autonomous University, said, adding that such immigrants often have more sex partners. In addition, undocumented immigrants are more likely to have sex with commercial sex workers without using condoms and use injection drugs, placing them at an increased risk of HIV, Yanez said. He added that although many women know that their partners have sexual relations with other people, they have no power to negotiate sex.
According to Axela Romero, general director of the Holistic Health for Women, women in the country also do not have the power to negotiate safer-sex practices because of fears of being mistreated or abused. "So we have women whose husbands swear to keep the fidelity but have sex with other women without protection," Romero said (Xinhuanet, 7/29).
Kaisernetwork.org is the official webcaster of the XVII International AIDS Conference in Mexico City. |
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