The impact of gender inequity is felt within women’s mental health. India ranks 127th out of 146 countries on the gender gap index (Global Gender Gap Report 2023), and 142th in the “health & survival” sub-index.
In November, Department of Global Health student Tikhala Itaye presented at the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), a high-level conference held in Nairobi and co-organized by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the governments of Kenya and Denmark.
In sub-Saharan Africa, many young women and adolescent girls are at high risk of HIV infection. In a new research paper published in the open access journal PLOS Medicine, Kenneth Mugwanya and co-authors report on a study aiming to investigate the feasibility of providing antiretroviral drugs via family planning clinics to prevent HIV infection in young women.
In a study of open-label Truvada as daily pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to prevent HIV among 427 young African women and adolescent girls, 95% initiated the HIV prevention strategy, and most used PrEP for the first three months. However, PrEP use fell among participants in this critical population during a year of follow-up clinic visits, although HIV incidence at 12 months was low. The preliminary results suggest that tailored, evidence-based adherence support strategies may be needed to durably engage young African women in consistent PrEP use.