Women more susceptible to HIV, says study

Women have a greater likelihood of selling sex for money or drugs and report significant reproductive health problems, says Murthy, who will present a paper on ‘Women and Substance Abuse’ at an International Conference on Opportunistic Pathogens in AIDS (ICOPA), to be held from January 27 to 29 at Delhi.

Women using drugs often have partners who use drugs and their risky behaviour affects the women, Murthy adds. Similarly, non substance using women who have substance using partners are also vulnerable and form a bridge population for the spread of HIV/AIDS. Awareness on HIV risk is inadequate, accessibility to services is limited and this population is greatly undeserved.

A recent Rapid Assessment Survey of Drug Abuse evaluated 4,648 drug users across 14 cities in India. Women drug users in this study, numbering 371, constituted 8 per cent of the drug users studied. Average age of respondents was between 26 and 31 years. Age of initiation of substance use was between 16 and 22 years. A majority of the women interviewed (60-75 per cent) were single and had drug using friends. Alcohol was the commonest drug of initiation, in 60 to 90 per cent of respondents, followed by cannabis, in more than half. In Mumbai, nearly half the users had initiated drug use with heroin. In Hyderabad, more than one-third of respondents reported injecting drug use (IDU). Age at first sexual experience was between 18 and 20 years of age.