ATTACK ON AIDS WIDENS; LATINAS LEARNING WOMEN ALSO AT RISK, NEED SELF-PROTECTION.

Byline: Gloria Gonzales Daily News Staff Writer

Once the women get comfortable, the questions fly in rapid-fire Spanish, and AIDS educator Emperatriz Pineda knows all the answers.

``The only way you could get the (AIDS) virus from ear piercing is if there was blood on the needle that hadn't been exposed to the air for very long,'' she tells a group of Spanish-speaking women sitting around a Formica table in a meeting room at Saint Paschal Baylon Catholic Church.

``It's possible to get the virus from tattooing or ear-piercing, but the chance is very, very small. The virus dies if it is exposed to air any length of time.''

The six women, most of whom are mothers, are concerned about ear piercing because of the common Latino practice of piercing an infant girl's ears.

The group, a domestic violence support group for Latinas living in the Conejo Valley, meets weekly. During this session, Pineda has come in to teach them about HIV, AIDS and safe sex.

Pineda, along with counselors from two other agencies in Ventura County, will intensify the focus on Latinas, a group at increasing risk for contracting the fatal virus.

``Women as whole are the fastest growing group with AIDS in the nation, and a large number of those are Latinas,'' Pineda said. ``We need to work with these women, especially monolingual women.''

``When I start the workshops, I hear so many women say, ``It's a gabacho (Anglo) problem,'' Pineda said. ``That's one of the main myths in the Latino community - that you can only get AIDS if you're a white homosexual.''

The truth, however, is that, in Ventura County and the rest of the nation, the AIDS rate among Latinos and African-Americans is increasing, while holding constant for whites. And for all groups, women are the fastest-growing group with new AIDS cases.

In Ventura County last year, Latinos made up 26 percent of the population, but they accounted for 38 percent of the new AIDS cases, up from 21 percent of the new cases in 1990.

This year, for the first time, the Ventura County AIDS Partnership is disbursing grants aimed at breaking down language and cultural barriers that might keep Latinas from protecting themselves. The three grants total $75,500, and one will finance programs for migrant farm workers, while two will help educate Latinas about safe sex.

At the simplest level, the grant money will allow educators to print more materials in Spanish. But it will also allow for more person-to-person contact through workshops.

Pineda, who has taught AIDS prevention in the county for almost 10 years, will be one of several teachers running workshops specifically for Spanish-speaking women. Pineda acknowledges that teaching Latinas about safe sex is as much about cultural re-education as it is about the basics of condom use.

``There's the language difference, and on top of that there are levels of literacy, education and class,'' Pineda said, outlining some of the barriers to effective AIDS education. ``And then there's the culture. We don't talk about sex. Communication about sex between a Latina and her man is a very difficult problem.

``There's the strong belief in many families that the man is the breadwinner, the leader, and the woman is subservient,'' Pineda said. ``Women are not encouraged to seek out information or to ask their husbands or partners questions about sex. To ask about those things would be improper. It would be like questioning his fidelity and his manhood.''

The problem is compounded and perpetuated because discussions about sex are often taboo not only between sex partners, but also between parents and children or among friends and siblings, Pineda says.

Programs targeting Latinas will try to combat the taboo by meeting with women on their home turf. The Coalition to End Sexual Violence sponsors the Latino women's group that Pineda works with at Saint Paschal Baylon Catholic Church.

``We'll try to get to Latinas through existing groups,'' said Rigoberto Vargas, executive director of El Concilio del Condado de Ventura, which will sponsor workshops for Latinas 21 through 45 years old. ``We'll go to church groups, social service agencies or work sites, because we're sensitive to the fact that women don't want to be labeled by attending an HIV education workshop.''

Vargas said the program will also work to train peer educators who will informally teach in homes, at workplaces or at churches.

A second program, headed by Planned Parenthood of Ventura County, will avoid the issue of embarrassment by targeting Latinas wherever they are.

``Our informational posters will go up in bar bathrooms, in Laundromats - anyplace where a woman might be by herself for a moment,'' said Xochi Gomez, director of the program. ``We just want a moment to get her to think about something she might not otherwise consider.''

The laminated posters will go up in five Ventura County cities, and will have tear-off coupons with information about confidential HIV testing.

``The goal is to get women in for testing and a safe-sex packet,'' Gomez said.

Personal contact and small-group settings hold the most promise for changing patterns of communication in the Latino community.

In Pineda's group, for example, the women begin with innocuous questions, then work up to the more difficult topic of how to ask your partner to use a condom.

Pineda hands out a card with ``condom comebacks'' written in Spanish - training women how to respond to common excuses.

``Just this once,'' a woman reads in Spanish, while another, giggling with embarrassment, rehearses her response.

``No way!''

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Chart: VENTURA COUNTY AIDS