 Message from HEARD's Director, Prof Alan Whiteside I have just three weeks of sabbatical left. It has been good to be in the northern hemisphere through a spring, summer and now an autumn. HEARD's Gender and HIV and AIDS Project Gender and gender inequalities are a central aspect in the transmission of HIV throughout the world, particularly in southern and eastern Africa South African Work-Family Symposium The South African Work-Family Symposium where employers can gauge their own progress on work-family policy against other players in the industry will take place on 30 November in Cape Town. Increasing African Capacity Central to HEARD's Capacity Building agenda, the Young Researchers Initiative (YRI) aims to provide support to young researchers based in eastern and southern Africa to produce high quality, accessible research on HIV/AIDS. At Last, Progress in Developing an AIDS Vaccine According to recent media reports, an experimental HIV vaccine has for the first time cut risk of infection. HEARD's Director, Prof Alan Whiteside was invited by OUPblog to post his views on this recent development which he says this will lead to new investment and energy in the development of vaccines. OUPblog is Oxford University Press' blogosphere for learning, understanding and reflection. A New HEARD Research Agenda on XDR-TB In response to the emergence of drug resistant TB in South Africa, HEARD has set up a research project to explore the reasons for the high levels of hospital transmission of XDR-TB.   | Newsletter Issue 1 October 2009 Gender and gender inequalities are a central aspect in the transmission of HIV throughout the world, particularly in southern and eastern Africa, yet in general - apart from a few well known examples such as Stepping Stones - programmes and policies typically do not integrate 'gender' adequately in their responses to HIV and AIDS, 1 and often have a relatively narrow focus on heterosexual sex, ignoring wider issues of sex and sexuality, such as men-who-have-sex-with-men (msm).2 Furthermore, while approximately 90% of HIV infections in southern and eastern Africa are sexually transmitted - sex is barely talked about in programmes and policies. HEARD's gender project aims to place gender, and sex and sexuality on the agenda of leaders in southern and eastern Africa in their response to HIV and AIDS. This aim is informed by, and supports, HEARD's broader agenda of building strategic leadership across Africa and innovative research of key drivers of the epidemic. The gender project has three main strands to it:
These three activities will each contribute to a better understanding of how gender, sex and sexuality have been incorporated into programmes and policies in southern and eastern Africa and also provide recommendations to parliaments, NACs, UNAIDS and civil society on how to strengthen such approaches. For more information on HEARD's gender project contact: Samantha Willan - 1Grieg, A. et al. (2008) Gender and AIDS: time to act. AIDS, 22(suppl. 2): S35-S43. 2Smith, A. (2009) Men who have sex with men and HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa. Lancet, 374: 416-422. |
