In Botswana, condom shortage adds to trans people’s health woes
When Kesego Otumile, a transgender woman from Botswana, sought treatment for a sexually transmitted infection at a village medical clinic, the female nurse refused to treat her and sent her to a male colleague instead. “She said she felt uncomfortable as ‘I’m like a man’,” Otumile told Openly by phone. “The male nurse then refused to give me condoms and said, ‘just abstain, you people are promiscuous and dirty’.” A 2019 court ruling that decriminalised gay sex in Botswana put the nation among a handful of African countries that have legalised same-sex relationships, but four years on, discrimination against LGBTQ+ people remains widespread.
As in other African nations, trans people in particular struggle to access public services including healthcare in the country of 2.5 million, raising their risk of sexually transmitted infections and HIV.
Trans people are at the greatest risk of HIV infection in Botswana, which is among the top four countries in the world most affected by HIV and AIDS with up to 400,000 people living with the virus, according to UNAIDS estimates.
Access to medical help is hampered by discrimination from staff, an ongoing shortage of condoms and a lack of sexual health awareness campaigns that address their particular needs, activists said. “The LGBTQ+ community is never adequately represented or identified directly and so they often feel left out and not represented in mainstream HIV/AIDS campaigns,” said Hazel Mokgathi, director of NGO African Women for Sexual Health.
