The focus of this thesis is an AIDS education programme targeting prostitutes in the industrial town of Thika, Kenya. The thesis challenges three key assumptions underlying the programme, namely: (1) prostitutes in Kenya form a readily identifiable, homogenous social category; (2) medically, they are a source of HIV-infection, and a risk group due to their sexual activity; (3) once provided with knowledge about AIDS transmission and prevention, they have the incentive, and the means to modify their risk behaviour. The notions of "prostitution", "risk", and "responsibility", as assumed in the medical discourse of the programme, are contrasted with those found in the narratives of local health workers and the women involved in the programme. The incongruences in these sets of understandings have implications for the interpretation of epidemiological findings and the planning of AIDS prevention programmes in general. By lending an overall priority ranking to the risk factor of sexual behaviour, the epidemiological paradigm informing the programme masks social and economic co-factors placing women at risk, as well as the role of men in transmission of the HIV-virus. Further, the paradigm ignores important factors in the motivation of health behaviour, namely, the relative significance that women attribute to the risk of AIDS, as well as their envisaged control over health.

No description available.