Relationship between socioeconomic status and HIV in women of reproductive age in Free State and Western Cape Provinces of South Africa

Includes bibliographical references.Health outcomes generally improve with increasing socio-economic status [SES]. This is referred to as the socioeconomic gradient in health. With regard to HIV, this gradient has been observed to conform to this general pattern and is consistent in developed countries but not in sub-Saharan African [SSA] countries. In SSA, observed patterns include; direct, inverse, lack of association and, dynamic association where the relationship changes over time. In general, literature shows that the relationship between SES as measured by education or asset quintiles and HIV changed from a direct association in early phases of the HIV epidemic to an inverse association in mature epidemics in majority of countries in SSA. In this study, we used a combination of measures of SES including education, assets, employment status and type of occupation to investigate the association between SES and HIV prevalence using data from a study that evaluated effectiveness of prevention of mother to child transmission of HIV program in Western Cape and Free State Provinces of South Africa