Double victims: poor women and AIDS

Abstract

Women constitute the fastest growing group of people with AIDS; a disproportionate number of poor minority women are affected. Education and prevention campaigns have not been directed at this population. Though intravenous drug users have been identified as "at risk," many American women have been identified as HIV positive only after giving birth to a child who develops AIDS. Combating AIDS in women offers a formidable challenge to social service and public health officials because it mandates consideration of intravenous drug abuse, high rates of unwanted and teenage pregnancies, poverty, discrimination and inadequate education.