The Her Rights Initiative (HRI) organisation is providing legal support to more than 100 HIV-positive women who were allegedly coerced into sterilisation.
HRI’s programme lead, Dr Sethembiso Promise Mthembu, said it filed a complaint with the United Nations in 2023, which wrote back in 2024, saying the women’s human rights and dignity were violated.
HRI, which was founded in 2009, was established to protect and defend the human rights of HIV-positive women in South Africa.
Monday marks World Aids Day.
Mthembu said HRI is representing 104 women from six provinces — KwaZulu-Natal, the Western Cape, Eastern Cape, Limpopo, Gauteng and Mpumalanga — in their fight for redress.
“These are women who were sterilised between 1997 and 2023, and almost all of them were between the ages of 17 and 32 at the time,” she said.
In 2015 HRI approached the commission for gender equality, which then started investigating the matter.
The commission released its report in 2020, which found that the state had violated a combination of 26 laws, which include women’s rights to dignity, bodily integrity and security over their bodies. It recommended that appropriate redress, restitution and rehabilitation be provided to the victims.
But Mthembu said the health department had not implemented those recommendations — and HRI is now considering legal action to secure justice.
Health department spokesperson Foster Mohale had not responded to questions at the time of going to print.
This report reaches parliament during the 16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children, a period when the nation reflects on the brutalisation and oppression of women and commits itself to action.
— Faith Muthambi, parliament health committee chairperson
One of the victims of forced sterilisation said she was diagnosed with HIV in 2000, and in 2011, when she was giving birth to twins, she was told that she had ”many children and I was HIV-positive“.
“At the time, I had only one child and was pregnant with twins,” said the woman from Magaliesburg. “I was made to sign papers while I was in pain on my way to the [operating] theatre. I was forced into it [sterilisation] because of my HIV status, and now I cannot have more kids.
“I didn’t know at the time that the papers I was signing were for sterilisation, but after giving birth, one of the nurses spoke casually about it, saying I did well by sterilising. I was shocked and scared.
“The fact that they took a decision for me shattered me. The health department failed me as a black woman.”
The parliamentary portfolio committee on health expressed pain and grave concern after the presentation it received from HRI last week regarding the forced sterilisation of black and impoverished HIV-positive women.
“This report reaches parliament during the 16 Days of Activism for No Violence Against Women and Children, a period when the nation reflects on the brutalisation and oppression of women and commits itself to action,” said committee chairperson Faith Muthambi.
The Treatment Action Campaign has called on the government to fix the ongoing crisis in clinics to get more HIV-positive people to restart or start taking treatment.
The campaign’s general secretary, Anele Yawa, said provinces should be held accountable: “Nothing will change if district and provincial health officials are in denial about the issues we keep on raising. If the government is serious about getting 1.1-million people to start/restart and stay on treatment, then there must be meaningful engagement and commitment, not only on paper or as lip service, but that we can see take effect in our clinics.”
The National Institute for Occupational Health has urged employers to implement a comprehensive workplace response to HIV, one rooted in health, wellness, dignity and inclusion.
“Workers are the backbone of the economy, and if their health and wellness are not prioritised in the workplace, it will adversely affect productivity, and the economy will suffer. If the economy suffers, people lose their jobs and families suffer,” said the institute’s Prof Muzimkhulu Zungu.
Dr Odwa Mazwai, managing director of Universal Care, lauded the government for its recent commitment to make groundbreaking HIV prevention drug lenacapavir accessible from next year.
He said this was a triumph for South Africa, which has over 8-million people with HIV.
“As a nation, we all share the responsibility to ensure that existing efforts to prevent the further spread of HIV do not decline in the wake of this positive news,” he said. “Rather, we must strengthen our approach to increase support for accessing care and taking medication correctly, both at home and in the workplace.
“While access to antiretroviral therapy has expanded significantly, consistent adherence to [the therapy] is essential to achieving viral suppression, preventing drug resistance, and ultimately, reducing HIV transmission.
“Various challenges face people living with HIV in taking their medication routinely and as prescribed — the only way to maintain an undetectable viral load, which means the virus cannot be transmitted to others," he said.
“Medication adherence is crucial for maintaining health but can be affected by factors such as complex dosing schedules and a lack of social support.”
Mazwai said irregular medication use was dangerous.
“It increases the risk of treatment failure, opportunistic infections, and the emergence of drug-resistant HIV strains. This, in turn, places additional strain on the health-care system and impedes national efforts to end Aids by 2030,” he said.
“In the journey to zero, every dose counts and every moment matters.”
Sowetan
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