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Walking the talk: Putting women's rights at the heart of the HIV and AIDS response

The inequalities and challenges faced by females providing care



Authors: Nick Corby; Nina O'Farrell; Mike Podmore; Carmen Sepúlveda Zelaya; ActionAid International
Publisher: Voluntary Service Overseas , 2007

Full text of document

This report from VSO and ActionAid focuses on the gender inequalities and challenges faced by women and girls who provide care for people living with and affected by HIV and AIDS. A distinction is made between primary care providers, family members or close friends who provide care and support in the home, and secondary care providers, visiting nurses, health workers or community care providers from NGOs or community groups. The report argues that neither primary nor secondary care providers are sufficiently supported or recognised for their care-providing efforts. Older women and younger girl carers are hit particularly hard because they tend to be missed by state support programmes. Recognising this, some countries are now targeting support for older women carers, such as Botswana and Lesotho which have introduced a non-contributory pension fund. Other potential forms of support for primary care providers include cash transfers, loans and microcredit schemes.

The report calls for the rights of secondary care providers to be recognised, including the right to a fair wage. One positive example can be found in Mozambique where the government has introduced legislation to ensure that care providers receive 60 percent of the minimum wage. However, these wages are still very low and can be hard to access. The authors recommend that multilateral organisations should ensure that international guidelines, such as the World Health Organization Care Guidelines, are updated to directly support the remuneration of care providers. They highlight how governments should increase the provision of social protection mechanisms to support primary care providers. In addition it is argued that civil society must create and strengthen local, national and regional community and home-based care alliances, to allow care providers to share knowledge, skills and resources.