Young Nigerian Woman Honored for Aids Activism

United States Department of State (Washington, DC)

May 6, 2004
Posted to the web May 7, 2004

Judy Aita
New York

Yinka Jegede-Ekpe receives Reebok Human Rights Award

A 25-year-old Nigerian woman infected with the HIV virus has been recognized with a 2004 Reebok Human Rights Award for her courageous work in changing her country's response to HIV/AIDS. She was honored with three other recipients at a gala event in New York May 5.

Yinka Jegede-Ekpe is acknowledged to be the first woman in Nigeria to speak out about and publicly discuss her illness. She then bravely went on to promote AIDS awareness, fight discrimination and establish the Nigerian Community of Women Living with HIV/AIDS that teaches women their rights and provides them with gender-specific information about AIDS.

As a 19-year-old nursing student Jegede-Ekpe risked being stoned to death to speak out. Although she feared she would be killed for doing so, she said, "I knew that Nigerian youth needed to hear about AIDS, that we were all vulnerable. If I didn't speak out, millions of young people would be infected before we knew it."

"Many more Africa women than men are infected with HIV," Jegede-Ekpe said. "Women have a biological vulnerability to HIV, as well as an economic one, and many cultural factors contribute to the high rates of infection among women in Africa. So I started focusing my attention on women because we are the ones who will be dying at home or caring for people who are sick and dying of AIDS."

The Reebok Human Rights Award recognizes young activists who early in their lives and against great odds have made significant contributions to the field of human rights strictly through nonviolent means, said Doug Cohn, head of Reebok's human rights department.

Since the award was established 15 years ago, 76 activists from 35 countries have been honored for their inspired leadership and service to the human rights movement, Cohn said. The aim of the award is to generate positive international attention for the recipients and support their efforts with a $50,000 grant to further their work.

After she developed an oddly persistent rash, Jegede-Ekpe went for tests at a local hospital. When she returned for the results she found that the doctors and nurses avoided her. She learned that she was infected with HIV. At nursing school, the principal tried to expel her, she was shunned, locked out of the women's bathroom and relegated to making beds.

The doctors and nurses "looked at me as if I were a living corpse," she said.

"The media would portray AIDS with a skull or a skeleton. It made people afraid. They didn't want to be near anyone affected and that fear made the stigmatization much worse. Some people were chased away by members of their own families or even stoned to death," Jegede-Ekpe said.

But Jegede-Ekpe decided that she would not be counted among the dead. She fought for her right to complete her nursing studies. When she found evidence that she had been infected through the poor hygienic practices of her dentist, she demanded that he change his practices and began promoting widespread AIDS education. And she joined a small group of activists to establish the first "persons living with HIV/AIDS" group in Nigeria.

A vibrant, glowing young woman who looks the picture of health, Jegede-Ekpe urged the audience filled with celebrities and top business leaders as well as school children, media, and other human rights activists to become involved. "Ask yourself: Am I doing something?" she said.

"Who and how are we going to deal with this problem? How are we to solve these difficulties? Who will take the political initiative?" Jegede-Ekpe said.

"Women should not be seen as the problem but part of the solution," she added. "We can help women to help themselves."

Of an estimated 28 million HIV-infected people in sub-Saharan Africa, she pointed out, roughly 58 percent are women and girls.

"African women are angry. We are dying without any just cause, knowing that there are life-saving drugs that prolong our life and these drugs are not accessible and affordable to common women and children," Jegede-Ekpe said.

"Women . . . are two faces of the same problem," she told the thousands gathered to honor her May 5. "The problem of poverty facing women has greatly impacted upon their vulnerability to HIV infection. The fact that women are more susceptible to HIV than men is a combination of biological, cultural and economic factors."

"Women are easily raped, lured into sex by someone older, stronger and richer. The saddest part is that children also face this abuse, because of the misconception that having sexual intercourse with a virgin would cure HIV," Jegede-Ekpe said. "School girls receive gifts from men old enough to be their fathers in return for sex."

This disposition promotes the spread of the virus among women. Many women of childbearing age get pregnant every day and most of those women are infected and can transmit the deadly virus to their babies without adequate information and comprehensive prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV programs, she said.

"Until women are seen as equal partners in the fight against HIV all the scientists in this world will not stop the problems of the epidemic," Jegede-Ekpe said.

She urged people to take care of the children orphaned by AIDS. "Who will care for them, pay their school fees, (provide) health care, good food and love them," she asked rhetorically.

Jegede-Ekpe is a member of Nigeria's National Action Committee on AIDS, and has toured several Nigerian states to develop an action plan for addressing the needs of people living with HIV/AIDS. She has also worked with other agencies such as the U.N. Children's Fund (UNICEF) on their HIV programs. She is currently the executive director of the Nigerian Community of Women Living with HIV/AIDS (NWC+).

(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)