God will look after us: Africans, HIV and religion in Milton Keynes

There has been very little academic research focusing on the role of religion in themanagement of a positive HIV diagnosis amongst African populations resident in Britain. American-based studies indicate that religious influences play an important role in coping with HIV (Simoni and Ortiz, 2003). Religiosity was found to have both positive and negative outcomes in alleviating HIV-related distress amongst African-American mothers (Prado et al, 2004). Limited research has been conducted in theUK, exclusively examining the role of faith communities’ responses to HIV and how individuals use their faith to cope with HIV in their lives. Data from the 2001 National Census show that the majority (72%) of the British population, including black Africans, reported that they were Christians (www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=293). Census data also show Africans as very religious, with only 2% reporting no religion at all. Although not exclusively focusing on religion, the dominance of Christianity is reported in surveys withAfricans in theUK affected by HIV (PositivelyWomen, 1994;Weatherburn et al, 2003; Doyal and Anderson, 2004, Sadler et al, 2005). Health needs assessment surveys of the general African population in the home counties show that most African respondents reported that they were Christians (Chinouya et al, 2003a,b; Chinouya, 2004). An extensive community-based study of sexual health and lifestyles amongst Africans in England found more than 90% of respondents identifying themselves as having a religion (Sadler et al, 2005). More than 50% of males and 60% of females reported regular attendance at services more than once a week. There is evidence that prayer has been used in themanagement of HIV (Chinouya and Davidson, 2003). Religion ABSTRACT