Elevated Risk: Injectable Contraceptives and HIV —a Reproductive Justice Perspective from South Africa.
Marion Stevens
“The new guidance is that women at high risk of acquiring HIV can use progestogen-only injectables but should be advised about concerns that these methods may increase risk of HIV acquisition, about the uncertainty over whether there is a causal relationship, and about how to minimize their risk of acquiring HIV (MEC category 2)
The guidance, which admits knowing since 1991 of a possible increased risk of contracting HIV while using DMPA, complicates the context for health programming in South Africa, where government and international agencies continue to provide complex and contradictory directives. South Africa adopted injectable contraceptives in the 1970s during the height of an internationally led movement for population control and national apartheid. Informed by business, technology and environmental stakeholders, population control policies emerged and became an enormous force with far-reaching resources deployed to curtail conceptions. Of concern has been the racial bias, with the orientation being to limit the numbers of black babies being born.”
Source :Pop-Dev Program
