ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the challenges Latino women populations in the United States, face as they attempt to reduce their risk of sexual transmission of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. It examines how the economic, cultural, and social realities of women's lives contribute to their risk of HIV infection and constrain their ability to reduce that risk. Because there is neither a cure for AIDS nor a vaccination to block HIV transmission, prevention of infection is the main objective of the global AIDS strategy. Discussions of HIV prevention among women typically emphasize the need to develop an unobtrusive female-controlled method that kills HIV and other pathogens while permitting conception. However, development of such a method has remained elusive, and current prevention efforts focus largely on promoting consistent condom use, which has been identified as the most effective HIV prevention strategy other than abstinence or a lifelong mutually monogamous relationship with an uninfected partner.
