Contraceptive May Increase the Spread of HIV in Black Women?

October 4th, 2011 - By Veronica Wells

Just today I read an article at “The State Column”.  Under the headline, “Contraceptive may increase risk of HIV in women: Study” the teaser read: ” A new study released Monday finds that African-American women using an injectable hormone contraceptive are twice as likely to spread the virus (HIV) to their male partners, compared to women who use no contraception.”

Whoa that’s some serious stuff. So I read on to find out exactly what this was about.

The study claimed that women who already had HIV were more likely to spread the disease to their uninfected partner, over the course of two years, if they used this injectable contraceptive than those who had not. Make sense so far. But the study involved 4,000 African couples.  One person (the woman) tested positive for HIV while her partner did not.  The couples were located in Bostwana, Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia to be exact. Researchers are hypothesizing that the women who use this drug have higher concentrations of HIV inside their cervixes.

So herein lies my confusion. If the study was conducted on African women, why were the results being applied to African-American women?

As an African American woman I’m not trying to further distinguish myself from our sisters in Africa. There’s been plenty of that. I realize our physiological makeup still holds several similarities to the women in Africa. And I won’t pretend that  HIV isn’t a serious issue within the black community, devastatingly so. But I’m also not ignorant enough to believe that black women are the only women who suffer from the disease.  If not one African American women participated in the study then I don’t understand how the results can be applied.

Can someone help me?

Even if the results are applicable to African-American women, how do we know they don’t transfer to all women equally. In fact, at the end of the article “The State Column” mentions that 12 million women in sub-Saharan Africa use this injectable contraceptive compared 1.2 million women in the United States. Women, not African American women. From my knowledge the study didn’t include European or American white women or any other racial/ethnic combination, so how do we know only African-American women need to be on alarm?

I won’t say outright that this is racial targeting but I will give “The State Column” a severe side eye.

You can read the entire article and results of the study over at “The State Column”.

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  • Sarpong

    After reading the story on the state column, it's easy to see that there were many flaws with the study. First of all, they don't state what percentage of women infected their partners. Also, starting a study with couples in which the woman was already infected already means the chances of passing infection are much higher. They say they followed the couples for two years, but they didn't say whether they were able to control for factors like which couples got married in the two years (which has an obvious impact on whether or not contraception is used since many married couples want kids). They do not mention if both parties were aware of their HIV status and that of their partner, or if they could be sure that the couples remained faithful to each other during the two years. There are so many factors that lead to infection in many African countries that are not even mentioned in this study. They don't even mention if they used rural or urban couples or a mixture which has a great effect on the results obtained.
    All in all, the study itself is very flawed, and any generalizations drawn from it are doomed to be just as flawed.

  • Gina

    Some of these so called "educated" white ppl are very racist. Terrible.

  • aquarian beauty

    why is everthing about black women these days???!! I never see any positive articles about our black queens! Its always why black women cant keep a man or garbage like this ” study”! Answer this for me : if all our black men are turning to white women then shouldnt the rate of a.i.d.s in the white community be rising??? I bet anything that jesus will walk on earth again before you read an article on that??

  • Kayla

    mhm.. they are always tryna do studies on us. dont you find it odd there is always a study on how black people are more likely to catch this or have that disease… mhmmm while white people are just epitome of clean… *side eye*

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000048183016 Sibongile Mbiza

    Before we can discuss the issue at hand….I would like to know what your opinion is about African women. Apparently there something sets African American Women apart from African Women!

    " If the study was conducted on African women, why were the results being applied to African-American women?"
    " I realize our physiological makeup still holds several similarities to the women in Africa"

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000048183016 Sibongile Mbiza

    Very interesting article! Before we can even discuss the issue at hand….I would like a clarification of your opinion about African women. Apparently there something sets African American Women apart from African Women!

    " If the study was conducted on African women, why were the results being applied to African-American women"?
    " I realize our physiological makeup still holds several similarities to the women in Africa"

    • Anna

      African American women are black women that reside in America. African women are women that reside in Africa.

      The writer of the article is talking about how this study was done on women that live in Africa and are of African descent that pose a higher risk of the spread of HIV. Problem is… They didn't survey the women that are of African descent that LIVE IN AMERICA and thus conclude that women of African descent that live in America pose a higher risk of spreading HIV when there is not proof of it being so.

  • manc

    The title of this piece is dangerously and deliberately misleading

  • Ms. Terious

    Sounds questionable to me. How can you make any implications if the sample size was not randomly selected? I agree with the author. Seems like a valid study, however. From what I understand, usage of the contraceptive increases the likelihood of contracting HIV. My next question would be….wouldn't an HIV person (men&women) use condoms in addition to the given contraceptive. The study doesn't specify if the women used additional forms of contraceptives. The title of the study implies "women" but the details of the article implies…"African-American women." To convince me, they would need to replicate this study ONLY using African-American women…..from…(guess where)…America. Overall, it seems like some sensationalist type garbage.

  • Mica

    the wording in the article is poor. They should specify that it is African Women and what regions they tested rather than lump every black woman in the same box.

    The other flaw in their results is that they did not provide the data for white women or non-black women taking contraception.

    The study is incredibly biased and poorly executed. It gets a big fail from me.