Can women 'refuse' condoms? Dilemmas of condom negotiation among men living with HIV in South Africa

This paper describes challenges that men living with HIV experience in negotiating condom use with sexual partners. After testing HIV-positive, the men in this study attended support groups of people living with HIV. Here they were taught to behave responsibly' by adopting safer sex measures. However, some men faced strong resistance from women concerning condom use, particularly from women with whom they had been sexually involved prior to testing HIV-positive. This paper explores the reasoning behind the rejection of condoms by women, focusing specifically on the nature of relationships, disclosure of HIV status and gender power dynamics. Analysis of the findings, which are taken from an ethnographic study conducted over 14 months, indicates that efforts to initiate condom use allowed women to challenge men's authority in sexual affairs and assert their own (limited) agency albeit by demanding unprotected sex. However, women's rejection of condoms occurred in a knowledge vacuum about their own HIV risk because male partners had failed to disclose their HIV status prior to initiating condoms. Interventions need to encourage men to disclose their HIV status before they initiate condom use with their sexual partners. Furthermore men need to encourage their partners to be open about their sexual needs.