HALIFAX – Canadian women and transgendered people are being left behind in HIV research according to a new report.
The National Consensus Statement on Women, Trans People and Girls and HIV Research is the culmination of two years of consultations and input from the community, researchers and the government.
It says even though advances have been made in HIV research, the number of women and transgendered people with HIV is on the rise and there are gaps in HIV research.
Dalhousie Health Promotions professor Jacqueline Gahaghan worked on the National Consensus Statement and said that, among other things, women are absent from clinical trials and advances in treatment are being tested on men, with results then being extrapolated to women.
Gahaghan said those gaps in research need to be addressed.
She said researchers don’t know enough about the life experiences of the two population groups — things such as their socioeconomic status, food insecurity and social stigma — to understand what factors contribute to their risk or what is limiting their access to testing and treatment.
“We don’t have exact numbers of trans individuals living with HIV, but we do know that the gender or component, or gender as a key determinant of health, factors into people’s ability to prevention infection and in terms of accessing treatment, care and support.”
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Gahaghan said if research does not engage women and transgendered people, it will only lead to increasing rates of infection. She is calling for more studies into the social factors as well as more funding to support HIV research and programs focused on the two groups.
Though the report is national in nature, she said there are many areas of improvement to target in Nova Scotia.
“Testing remains one significant challenge. We do know there are gender dynamics about who is coming forward for testing and why,” Gahaghan said.
She said women who aren’t offered HIV testing in the course of concurrent prenatal testing often don’t get asked if they want to be tested.
The Nova Scotia Advisory Commission on AIDS said the gaps in research put vulnerable populations in an even more precarious position.
“We need to know more,” said Michelle Proctor-Simms, director of the advisory commission.
The advisory commission is an arms-length organization of the Department of Health and Wellness that advises the province on HIV/AIDS related matters.
“If we’re developing policy, if we’re developing services, we really need to understand…who are we targeting, what are the best messages to develop,” Proctor-Simms said.
The advisory commission is using the report to make recommendations to the province, such as more funding for HIV research and studies about promoting more support for women and transgendered people.
The statement is meant to guide research and policy, and the next step for researchers is a conference of the Canadian Association of HIV Research in Newfoundland, where the report’s 31 recommendations will be discussed.
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