‘€œIn South Africa more than 1  000 people are newly infected (with HIV) every day. The majority of those are women. The epidemic in this country has the face of a woman. Advocacy towards prevention has been really weak’€, said Nomfundo Eland, Chairperson of SANAC’€™s women’€™s sector. Eland was addressing the recently-held ‘€œHIV Prevention for Women and Girls Summit’€, in Johannesburg.

She referred to the latest research by the Human Sciences Research Council, which shows that, ‘€œfemales from the ages of 25 – 29 have the highest (HIV) prevalence in South Africa at about 32, 7 percent. The national average is 10, 9 percent’€.

‘€œThere is a need to protect them (women) from the factors that put them at risk, issues such as the economic status of women, issues like gender-based violence, inaccessibility of prevention measures that are directed at women, like female condoms’€, she said.

‘€œSouth Africa has great policies and yet failure to implement these policies undermines efforts in totality. Inequalities that exist in our strategies, such as the distribution of condoms – for instance, about 3  500  000 condoms for women are distributed and 450  000  000 male condoms are distributed. That means four women will be sharing one condom’€™, she continued.

In defence of the Health Department, Eva Marumo, its HIV and STI Prevention Unit Head, said, ‘€œthe department is buying female condoms from (its) own fiscal. There’€™s no donor supporting that, currently’€.

However, advocates of female condoms, disagree. Tian Johnson, Advocacy Officer of the Thohoyandou Victim Empowerment Programme (TVEP), raised concern over the awarding of the tender for the manufacture of female condoms.  

‘€œThe current situation pertaining to the inadequate access to the female condom in South Africa today is a violation of the rights of women and men of this country. The tender for female condom supply has been awarded the ‘€œFemale Health Company’€. That means there are no options for competition, there are no options for bringing prices down. That enables us to use the excuse that we have been using for far too long, the excuse that$, female condoms are too expensive. It’€™s an excuse with no basis and with no merit’€, he said.