Haircut, highlights and safe sex tips in Havana
Posted: Thursday, March 01, 2007 8:02 AM
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Havana, Cuba
By Mary Murray, NBC News Producer
Sex, cheating husbands, AIDS … That’s the talk at Havana’s Aphrodite Beauty Parlor and it’s enough to curl your hair.
The salon — located in Cerro, a dense urban district with the fourth-highest incidence of HIV infection on the island — is really a store-front health center in disguise.
Hairdresser Leticia Santa Cruz, 43, came up with the idea. She wanted a sure-fire way of reaching middle-aged married women, a vulnerable sector of Cuban society and a group frequently overlooked by AIDS educators.
Santa Cruz has cut hair in this neighborhood for 17 years and, after losing a dear friend to AIDS, began work as a community AIDS activist for almost the same stretch of time. "I’ve heard a million stories from my clients," she said.
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| Roberto León/NBC News |
| A customer at Havana’s Aphrodite Beauty Parlor reading an AIDS pamphlet as she sets her hair. |
Women feel safe in the female world of a beauty parlor, she believes. "Here, they can laugh or cry. They can pour out their hearts and soul."
She sold her idea to Cuba’s health ministry, convinced allies in the battle against AIDS to join her, and found $50,000 in funding from U.N. agencies. Even before they finished fixing up an abandoned beauty parlor, women began lining up at the door.
"The beauty parlor is really a pretext to educate women about dangers in their lives," said Santa Cruz. "Here, we are more interested in teaching women about safe sex than fixing their hair."
AIDS awareness in lieu of glossy mags
Lucia Alvarez, 23, looking for a Saturday make-over, stared stupefied at the receptionist when handed a free condom and a safe sex pamphlet along with her appointment slip. The literature entitled "Women and AIDS" discusses the special risks and vulnerabilities gender specific to women and facts on how to prevent infection.
Housewife Nancy Ramos, accompanied by a granddaughter in diapers, planned to spend the morning getting highlights and a curl. Instead of flipping through a magazine as she waited her turn in the chair, she was poised in front of an AIDS prevention educational video running non-stop.
Ramos obliged but shrugged when asked what she thought about the video’s message. "I guess it’s great they offer information to women about AIDS prevention but I’m just happy the beauty shop is open again. I’ve been a client here for years."
Clearly, practicing safe sex is the farthest thing from this older woman’s mind but that’s what Aphrodite hopes to combat.
"People think AIDS is a gay issue or a youth issue. And these women think they are immune because they are married and monogamous. They would die before asking their husbands to use a condom," said Dr. Zenia Lazo, the neighborhood’s chief epidemiologist.
In her mind, these "generational prejudices" has led to an alarming trend. "The age group most affected in this neighborhood is between 35 and 39 years of age. And, there is a slight rise among older women, from 40 to 50 years of age."
Last year she detected the HIV virus in 12 neighborhood women, up from one or two in previous years. "Fundamentally these are mature women in long-term marriages. They were infected by their husbands who engaged in extra-marital affairs with men," said Lazo. This fact, she learned, through a patient interview technique epidemiologists here employ called "contact tracing."
Anyone found to be infected with the HIV virus is asked to name all their sexual partners during the past five years, explained Lazo. Public health officials then visit the person to both inform them that they are at risk and urge testing.
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| Roberto León/NBC News |
| Leticia Santa Cruz, a hairdresser at Havana’s Aphrodite Beauty Parlor, as well as an AIDS activist, discusses her work. |
Aggressive anti-AIDS campaign
Twenty years ago when HIV first surfaced, Cuban health authorities forcibly isolated anyone infected in sanatoriums to be treated medically, but also cutting them off from family, friends and general society at a frightening and vulnerable moment in their lives.
Cuba also imposed mandatory testing for specified groups that included anyone diagnosed with other sexually transmitted diseases and their partners, anyone admitted to the hospital or undergoing outpatient surgery, all pregnant women, prisoners and merchant marines.
The rules have relaxed with time and a better understanding of the disease, surer access to life-extending medications and sharp global censure over the human rights violations involved in the previous policy.
Current policy dictates that individuals must consent to HIV testing and it is no longer compulsory for HIV patients to stay at sanatoriums -- although anyone newly diagnosed is urged to attend a two-month long education program aimed at learning to live with AIDS.
Currently 6,541 people in Cuba are infected with the HIV virus, including 1,672 people living with AIDS — 80.6 percent are men and 19.4 percent are women. Over the past 22 years, 1,546 Cubans with the HIV virus have died — 1,444 from AIDS and 102 from other causes, including suicide.
Cuba’s HIV infection rate of less than 0.1 percent is enviously low in a region with one of the fastest-growing infection rates in the world, second only to sub-Saharan Africa. Some foreign tourist agents actually promote the island as an "AIDS-free destination."
Health officials and AIDS activists warn people are dropping their guard, pointing to a recent rise in the number of people testing positive for HIV — 942 new cases were diagnosed in 2005 and 1,120 new cases in 2006.
One historic challenge Lazo and other Cuban doctors faced were to guarantee their patients a consistent supply of anti-retroviral drugs. Initially the U.S. trade ban and the island’s dire economic circumstances inhibited access.
By 2001, the island’s sophisticated biotechnology industry began manufacturing generic versions of the drugs. Today they are distributed free of charge to all HIV/AIDS patients.
Big plans for the beauty parlor
Lazo has big plans for Aphrodite. She plans to survey the women about risky sexual practices, eventually start a Help Line out of the salon, arrange workshops on violence prevention and self-esteem building, and set-up an in-house confidential HIV testing site.
Presently, part of the doctor’s job is to help the newly diagnosed come to grips with their disease. "Some want to die of shame. Others want to commit suicide," said Lazo. "We teach people how to live with HIV and how to practice prevention. After a year passes, I go back and tell them ‘You see? There is life with AIDS.’ Many begin volunteering as peer counselors."
Laura Cuadra, 52, stands at the door of the beauty parlor, handing out pamphlets to passersby. Three years ago, she feared one of her children was infected with the virus. "Fortunately that was not the case but it was a turning point in my life."
Cuadra, an insurance agent, signed up for community service through Cuba’s National Center for HIV/AIDS Prevention and found she had a special ability to communicate with young people. "Wherever I find a group of kids, I take the opportunity to talk about safe sex. I even show how to correctly use a condom," Cuadra said.
Initially, she admits, the kids are embarrassed to hear this "old lady" talk about sex. "But, once they overcome their generational mindset, they respond to me because I am showing them how to stay healthy." AIDS, she teaches, knows no age.
