The Other Half - New York Times

Chairman of National Action Committee on AIDS in Nigeria highlights the well known fact that many AIDS patients in Africa are victims of sexual violence and suggests some solutions, other than abstinence...

The Other Half - New York Times: "For example, a major partner, the United States government, enthusiastically promotes abstinence until marriage as the main way for young people to avoid H.I.V. infection. Abstinence is one critical prevention strategy, but it cannot be the only one. Focusing on abstinence assumes young people can choose whether to have sex. For adolescent girls in Nigeria and in many other countries, this is an inaccurate assumption. Many girls fall prey to sexual violence and coercion. Many others are married off very young, as young as 13 or 14, long before they are psychologically or physically ready. Abstinence is not an option for these girls, nor is getting their partners to use condoms. It is unacceptable for a woman or girl to ask her partner to use one in our part of the world. In Nigeria, only 23 percent of the men and 8 percent of women use condoms regularly, and, as elsewhere, almost none of them use condoms with a spouse or primary partner."