Addressing violence against women in HIV testing and counselling

Overview

The growing access to anti-retrovirals (ARVs) and the recognition of the potential benefits of people knowing their HIV status has prompted a stronger interest in making HIV testing more widely available. At the same time, there is increasing recognition that the HIV epidemic intersects in different ways with the epidemic of violence against women and girls.

Therefore, the World Health Organization (WHO) departments of Gender, Women and Health (GWH) and of Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS) co-convened an international meeting to discuss how HIV testing and counselling programmes can take into account and address as necessary intimate partner violence and other concerns related to women.