The purpose of this paper is to analyse the link between human rights and, HIV and AIDS. It also assesses whether persons who experience inequality, prejudice, marginalisation and limitations in their social, economic and cultural rights are at a greater risk of HIV exposure. The study aims to assess whether persons living with cognitive disabilities have been a marginalised in the international and regional responses to HIV and AIDS, because cognitive disabilities impact on the basic social skills of an individual such as reading, writing, interacting with people and affect the ability of an individual to learn new things and infer information from social cues and body language. The author will therefore review specific international human rights instruments, African human rights instruments and some national policies and legislation in order to examine this, and based on the findings will provide recommendations accordingly. / Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / gm2014 / Centre for Human Rights / unrestricted