Cheyutha, an HIV self-help group in Hyderabad, India, believes matchmaking marriages between diagnosed men and women is one way to prevent the spread of the disease and combat discrimination.

The founder of the community-based organization, ​Laxmi Priya Kagitha, has so far matched 65 marriages between HIV positive men and women and claims the controversial process helps couples not only fit into a society that sees marriage as the norm, but alleviates depression, and helps prevent transmission of the disease.

“A [HIV] positive marriage helps young, infected people live with dignity. It also helps prevent new infections in young people and it being passed on to newborn babies,” said Kagitha. She explained that by facilitating marriages between HIV positive people, it stops them from feeling like they must keep their diagnosis a secret in order to find a spouse, marry an HIV negative person, and thus potentially put them, and any possible children, at risk of carrying the immunodeficiency virus.

At the end of 2016, there were approximately 36.7 million people living with HIV worldwide, 2.1 million of those were living in India. The majority of affected people, some 20.9 million, were being treated using antiretroviral therapy, or ART, and able to manage the physical effects of their disease but, according to data from UNAIDS, there were still 62,000 HIV-related deaths that year in India.

In terms of prevention, awareness-raising activities, pre-exposure prophylaxis, and sexual education are all well-known methods practiced around the world. But marriage matchmaking — a culturally conservative social practice common in India — is one that some in the global development community are likely to see as controversial.

Read the full article about combatting HIV in India with arranged marriages by Rebecca Root at Devex International Development.