As part of the main drivers of the BAM Group of Companies, this being the umbrella company within which Informative Newspaper operates, alongside sister brands Finite Magazine, Finite Lifestyle Club, Bam Promotions and Twin Talk, Informative Newspaper takes particular interest in social issues and causes created to advance the development of young girls and women and their participation in the global space.
To advance and cement the organization’s support for women and young girls, the Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights is today, through this issue introduced. Its purpose is to advance knowledge and create further awareness on developments surrounding the said community sector and to help audiences stay updated on such, further guiding means of both action and reaction to these developments.
This week we discuss: What can parliamentarians do to advance the rights of women and girls living with HIV to SRHR?
Undertake advocacy research: Parliamentarians can initiate research into the sexual and
reproductive health needs of women living with HIV, including causes and consequences of violence against women and girls, including women living with HIV, especially the consequences for their SRH. They can investigate whether health care workers have been adequately trained to identify and treat violence against women and offer comprehensive post-rape care to women and girls.
They can also investigate whether HIV-related care and sexual and reproductive health care have been integrated and are easily accessible to women and girls living with HIV. Parliamentarians can investigate the availability of CSE for adolescents and young people that includes information and education about contraception, HIV, STIs and safe sex. They can also undertake research to assess the efficacy of programmes to reduce violence against women and advocate for the wider implementation of successful programmes.
Enact and strengthen protective laws: Parliamentarians draft and enact laws that create
an enabling environment for women and girls by strengthening laws promoting equality and non-discrimination and protect them from violence:
They can ensure that laws:
• Protect, promote and fulfil the right to equality and non-discrimination for all women and girls, including those living with HIV;
• Include an explicit right to SRH;
• Promote equal, non-discriminatory access to a comprehensive package of sexual and reproductive health services for all women, including those living with HIV;
• Promote access to a comprehensive package of post-rape care;
• Criminalise all forms of GBV, including marital rape;
• Promote access to protection services for women and girls, including through access to
shelters;
• Promote access to contraception and information about contraception and family planning for
women and girls, including appropriate contraception for women and girls living with HIV;
• Prohibit any form of coercion in access to sexual and reproductive health care, including
sterilisation;
• Do not criminalise methods of preventing pregnancy;
• Do not criminalise HIV transmission, exposure and/or non-disclosure;
• Do not require spousal or parental consent to access sexual and reproductive health care;
• Respect the right to medical confidentiality for women and girls, including that which relates to HIV status and Promote CSE for adolescents and young men and women.
Ensure accountability for implementation of commitments:
Parliamentarians can undertake legal audits to assess the extent to which laws and policies are consistent with their international and regional human rights commitments. They can meet with the relevant parliamentary committees to share information and concerns about discriminatory laws and assess what changes are necessary to advance equality for women and ensure that they can exercise their SRHR.
They can meet with international and regional experts to discuss what law reform is necessary and advocate for legal and policy reform to ensure compliance. They can monitor and hold government ministries accountable for reporting on their progress towards amending discriminatory laws and enacting protective ones, and they can encourage civil society to monitor whether protective laws are being implemented. Where they find deficits, they can advocate for legal and policy reform to ensure compliance. Parliamentarians can encourage governments to develop national plans of action on violence against women. They can monitor and hold government ministries accountable for reporting on their progress and achievements to achieve goals to protect the SRHR of women living with HIV.
They can also call for accountability to and reporting on efforts to meet related international and regional human rights commitments.
Budget monitoring: Parliamentarians can advocate for adequate budgets to be allocated for measures to advance universal access to SRH and eliminate GBV. They can analyse budget allocations for SRH and HIV-related services to assess that programmes will reach women living with HIV and other vulnerable and marginalised women. They can encourage various ministries (e.g. health, education, justice) to budget for relevant programmes and to ensure that human rights are fully integrated into programmes on contraception, and that they are appropriately costed to ensure implementation.
Be an opinion leader and influencer: Parliamentarians can become opinion leaders on the unacceptability of violence against women and the importance of SRHR for women living with HIV. By speaking out, parliamentarians can help to build an enabling environment for women and girls to seek protection from violence and access to SRH, including in the aftermath of violence.
They can advocate for the rights of women living with HIV and frame access to SRH as a human rights issue. They can attend events and speak out to frame GBV as a human rights issue. They can use international or national human rights days, including the 16 Days of Activism to End Violence against Women (25 November – 10 December), International Women’s Day (8 March) and World AIDS Day (1 December) to increase awareness of violence against women and girls, including those living with HIV, the links between HIV and violence against women and SRHR. They can also work within Parliament and in parliamentary forums and networks, to raise awareness of these issues amongst fellow parliamentarians. They can share lessons learned at regional and global level with other parliamentarians.
Engage with civil society: Parliamentarians can engage with civil society organisations (CSOs), including those led by women living with HIV, health care workers and other groups working on women’s rights, violence against women, HIV and sexual and reproductive rights to increase awareness, understanding and information on women and girls’ higher risk of HIV, the need for access to sexual and reproductive health care, including for women and girls living with HIV, and violence against women.
They can invite CSOs and the communities they work with, to provide expert information at
parliamentary hearings on all forms of violence against women and harmful practices, HIV, prevention efforts and barriers to women and girls exercising their sexual and reproductive rights. Parliamentarians can play an important role in ensuring that the voices of women and girls, including those living with HIV, are included in discussions about their lives, and help to empower women and girls living with HIV to advocate on their own behalf.
Represent their electorate: Parliamentarians can engage with key stakeholders within communities – women living with HIV, health care workers, parents, traditional leaders and religious leaders, to increase awareness of the human rights. In particular, parliamentarians can ensure they include the voices of girls and women living with HIV at the centre of these conversations.
Work with the media: Parliamentarians should engage with and reflect the concerns of all them
electorate, including women living with HIV. Parliamentarians can work with the media to raise awareness and to encourage responsible reporting on SRHR of women living with HIV, including GBV against women living with HIV. They can encourage the media to write stories that do not reinforce stigma and discrimination against women living with HIV and create awareness of the sexual and reproductive rights of all women, including those living with HIV.
Next we discuss: Adolescent girls and young Women
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