Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has made an assessment of the comparative effectiveness of different strategies to empower women for the purposes of tackling gender-based disparities within the Black community that may contribute to HIV transmission.

No formal assessment has been made but it is a key principle of our approach, as set out in the HIV Action Plan, to ensure that all populations benefit equally from improvements made in HIV outcomes, including women in black communities. This includes scaling up HIV testing in targeted, high-risk populations and increasing equitable access to and use of HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP).

HIV Prevention England delivers a nationally co-ordinated programme of HIV prevention work designed to complement locally commissioned HIV prevention in areas with high HIV prevalence and for communities at risk of HIV transmission, with a particular focus on Black African women.