Designing strategies to reach the maximum number of women for comprehensive knowledge of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)

Background: Globally women are the major victims of socio-economic and political inequalities. This applies equally to stigma and discrimination related to HIV awareness and treatment. The biggest challenge is not only to reach all HIV-infected people but also to reach the maximum number of people for counseling and testing to avoid future transmission. There is a need to frame cost-effective, rapid, and confidential awareness strategies that will eventually encourage people to test. Study Design: Anonymized, publicly available data of the India National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5) and ASHAs per state is collected from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, India. Descriptive statistical analysis, linear regression analysis, and Pearson correlation coefficient analysis were done for the data. Results: The multiple linear regression equation for women with comprehensive HIV knowledge (%) shows an R square value of 0.2338 for an overall p-value of 0.0123. Pearson correlation indicated that there is a non-significant medium negative relationship between ASHAs per state (%) and women with knowledge of HIV (%) ( r = -0 .315, p = 0.061). Whereas, the results of the Pearson correlation indicated that there is a significant medium-positive relationship between the percentage of women with internet access and the percentage of women with comprehensive knowledge of HIV, ( r =0 .481, p = 0.003). Conclusions: Internet access to women is more beneficial in states where the literacy is high. In areas where internet access and understanding content in English is an issue, community health workers can provide better support to spread awareness. Received: 04 August 2024 Accepted: 11 November 2024 Published: 17 December 2024