Vulnerability of lesbian and bisexual women to HIV: A qualitative meta-synthesis

The concept of vulnerability in the field of health is understood as the possibility of exposing a person to illness, considering individual and collective factors contextualized around a disease. According to the exposition, three dimensions of vulnerability are individual, social, and programmatic.

The configuration of literary productions on the vulnerability and/or sexual practices of women who have sex with women is still less present in studies on sexuality and sexual health.

The AIDS epidemic strengthened the LGBT movement by enabling the social debate on sexuality and homosexuality, enabling public health policies that contemplated the specificities of this population. Sexual practices among women who have sex with women (a universe that includes both lesbians and bisexuals) were made invisible in the context of HIV infection due to the initial idea of contagion, in which it was thought that the spread of the virus occurred only through the sharing of body fluids.

HIV/AIDS is a topic widely studied in scientific research. However, these studies related to the field of sexuality still present a panorama predominantly focused on male sexual practices in relation to female sexual practices, either in the context of heterosexuality or still relatively incipient when focused on female homosexuality. Given the above, it is essential to identify and analyze the production of knowledge in the health literature on vulnerabilities to HIV in the context of lesbians and bisexual women. This study aimed to analyze scientific evidence on the vulnerability of lesbian and bisexual women to HIV, compared to heterosexual women.

• Population(s)
  • Women
  • General HIV- population