**The Impact of Social and Psychological Factors on HIV/AIDS and Related Behaviours**

204 Social and Psychological Aspects of HIV/AIDS and Their Ramifications

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**11** 

*The Netherlands* 

**Societal Beliefs and Reactions** 

*School of Public Health and Primary Care (CAPHRI)* 

**About People Living with HIV/AIDS** 

Ngozi C. Mbonu, Bart Van Den Borne and Nanne K. De Vries

Although the overall growth of the global AIDS epidemic appears to have stabilized, still, Sub-Saharan Africa has the majority of new infections with 1.8 million (1.6 million- 2.0 million) people becoming infected in 2009 (UNAIDS, 2010). Sub-Saharan Africa remains the region most heavily affected by HIV/AIDS, accounting for 68% of all people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) and for 72% of AIDS related deaths in 2009 (UNAIDS, 2010). In West Africa, Nigeria has the largest epidemic in absolute numbers (UNAIDS, 2008) with 2.98 million people living with HIV and 192,000 adults and child deaths from AIDS in 2009 (UNAIDS, 2010). The HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in Nigeria remains uneven across different states (Utulu & Lawoyin, 2007; UNAIDS, 2010). A retrospective study carried out between 2000 and 2004 among 10,032 pregnant women attending the antenatal clinic at the Braithwaite Memorial Hospital, Port Harcourt Nigeria showed that 5.93% of the women were HIV- positive patients (Obi et al., 2007). Another study carried out in the university teaching hospital at Port Harcourt Nigeria between 1999 and 2004 showed a paediatric prevalence rate of 25.8% (Alikor & Erhabor, 2005). More recently, HIV prevalence among pregnant women attending antenatal clinic in Rivers State is 7.3% in 2008 (UNAIDS, 2010) making Rivers state one of the states with high HIVprevalence among pregnant women in

One of the many challenges associated with HIV/AIDS is stigma. Stigma is generally recognized as an 'attribute that is deeply discrediting' that reduces the bearer 'from a whole and usual person to a tainted, discounted one' (Goffman, 1974). Herek (2002) describes stigma as an enduring condition, status, or attribute that is negatively valued by a society and whose possession consequently discredits and disadvantages an individual (Herek, 2002). Steward and colleagues noted further that stigma is very much about the socially constructed meanings associated with the attribute or characteristic (Steward et al., 2008). Because AIDS or HIV infection is an enduring condition or characteristic that is negatively valued (Herek, 2002), AIDS-related stigma continues to be a barrier to caring for, and

Stigma arises and stigmatization takes shape in specific contexts of culture and power (Parker & Aggleton, 2003). Stigma is especially significant in many developing countries, such as those in Africa, where social networks and, therefore, societal values, are relatively

supporting, people whose HIV status is known in society (Campbell et al., 2007).

**1. Introduction** 

Nigeria.

*Faculty of Health Medicine and Life Sciences, Maastricht University* 
