Half the Sky: Turning Oppression Into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas D. Kristof; Sheryl WuDunn

Author:Nicholas D. Kristof; Sheryl WuDunn
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Social Science, Women - Crimes against - Developing countries, Violence in Society, Political Science, Women's Studies, Women's Studies - General, Political Freedom & Security, Women - Developing countries - Social conditions, Developing Countries, Women, Political Freedom & Security - Human Rights, International Relations, Political Advocacy, Civil Rights, Crimes against, Sociology Of Women, Political And Civil Rights, Women's rights, Human rights, Political Process, General, Gender Studies, Case studies, Social conditions, Politics, Women's rights - Developing countries
ISBN: 9780307387097
Publisher: Random House, Inc.
Published: 2010-09-15T08:30:35.216000+00:00

Thabang in front of the shack she dreads in South Africa, where her mother is dying of AIDS (Nicholas D. Kristof)

“I’m a virgin, whatever my mother says,” Thabang said, and she began to cry as well. “She never believes me. She just yells at me.”

“Your mother loves you,” Nick told her. “The only reason she scolds you is that she loves you and cares what happens to you.”

“She doesn’t love me!” Thabang replied fiercely, tears trickling down her cheeks as she stood outside her home fifteen feet away from her mother, who was also crying. “If she did, she would talk to me instead of beating me. She wouldn’t say these things about me. She would accept my friends.”

There’s no question that the local schools should encourage abstinence for girls like Thabang. But those programs shouldn’t stop there. They should explain that condoms can dramatically reduce the risk of HIV transmission, and they should demonstrate how to use condoms properly. Governments should encourage male circumcision, which reduces HIV risk significantly, and should encourage free screening and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases. Testing for HIV should become routine, requiring people to opt out instead of to opt in. That way, nearly all adults would know their AIDS status, which is crucial, because it’s impossible to contain an epidemic when people do not know whether or not they have been infected. That kind of comprehensive approach to prevention would be most effective in reducing the risks to a girl like Thabang. And these prevention methods are much cheaper than treating an AIDS patient for years.

Most of the studies on preventing AIDS aren’t rigorous, but scholars at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Poverty Action Lab—which does some of the finest research on development anywhere—have examined four different strategies against AIDS in careful trials in Africa. Each strategy was tried in randomly chosen areas, and the results were compared to results in control areas. Success was measured by pregnancies averted (compared to the control areas), since they presumably reflected the amount of unprotected sex that could also transmit AIDS.

One strategy was to train elementary school teachers in AIDS education; that cost only $2 per student but had no impact on reducing pregnancies. A second approach was to encourage student debates and essays on condoms and AIDS; that cost only $1 per student but was not shown to reduce pregnancies. A third approach was to provide students with free uniforms to encourage them to stay in school longer; that cost about $12 per student and did reduce pregnancies. Using their comparisons with the control areas, the researchers calculated that the cost was $750 per pregnancy averted. The fourth and by far the most cost-effective approach was also the simplest: warning of the perils of sugar daddies. Schoolchildren were shown a brief video of the dangers of teenage girls going out with older men, and then were informed that older men have much higher HIV infection rates than boys. Few students had been aware of that crucial fact.

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