Citation

Beres LK, Merrill KG, McGready J, Denison JA, Schwartz S, Sikazwe I, Decker MR. Glob. Public Health 2019; ePub(ePub): ePub.

Affiliation

Center for Public Health & Human Rights, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1080/17441692.2019.1686532

PMID

31710273

Abstract

Women in sub-Saharan Africa are disproportionately at risk for the dual epidemics of intimate partner violence (IPV) and HIV. Little is known about how specific violence profiles affect women's HIV risk, limiting effective intervention. We analysed couples' data from the Zambia Demographic and Health Survey 2013-2014 to evaluate relationships among IPV, male partner HIV status and women's HIV status. We considered the individual and combined effects of physical, sexual, emotional, and high controlling behaviour violence and accumulated violence exposure, respectively. Among partnered women, 48.9% (n = 2,812) experienced IPV victimisation, of whom 52.1% (n = 1,465) reported polyvictimisation (experiencing two or more violence types). Female HIV prevalence was 13.2%. Adjusted for demographics, HIV was significantly higher for women who experienced three (17.3%, aPR 1.33, 95%CI: 1.04-1.69, p = 0.02) or four (22.1%, aPR 1.66, 95%CI: 1.23-2.26, p ≤ 0.01) types versus no IPV. Violence including emotional and/or high controlling victimisation was associated with female HIV infection (aPR: 1.31, 95%CI: 1.09-1.57, p = 0.01). Physical and/or sexual violence victimisation in the absence of other victimisation was not associated with HIV (aPR: 0.92, 95%CI:0.73-1.15, p = 0.46). IPV and HIV interventions are incomplete without addressing emotional and controlling IPV and the role of coercive relationship dynamics in transmission risk.

Language: en

Keywords

HIV; IPV; Zambia; polyvictimisation; women