Dataset Information

Homelessness and Other Risk Factors for HIV Infection in the Current Outbreak Among Injection Drug Users in Athens, Greece.

ABSTRACT: Objectives. We examined HIV prevalence and risk factors among injection drug users (IDUs) in Athens, Greece, during an HIV outbreak. Methods. We used respondent-driven sampling (RDS) to recruit 1404 IDUs to the Aristotle intervention in August to October 2012. We interviewed participants and tested for HIV. We performed bivariate and multivariate analyses. Results. Estimated HIV prevalence was 19.8% (RDS-weighted prevalence?=?14.8%). Odds of infection were 2.3 times as high in homeless as in housed IDUs and 2.1 times as high among IDUs who injected at least once per day as among less frequent injectors (both, P?

SUBMITTER: Sypsa V

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4145040 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Homelessness and Other Risk Factors for HIV Infection in the Current Outbreak Among Injection Drug Users in Athens, Greece.

Sypsa Vana V Paraskevis Dimitrios D Malliori Meni M Nikolopoulos Georgios K GK Panopoulos Anastasios A Kantzanou Maria M Katsoulidou Antigoni A Psichogiou Mina M Fotiou Anastasios A Pharris Anastasia A Van De Laar Marita M Wiessing Lucas L Jarlais Don Des DD Friedman Samuel R SR Hatzakis Angelos A

American journal of public health 20150101 1

Objectives. We examined HIV prevalence and risk factors among injection drug users (IDUs) in Athens, Greece, during an HIV outbreak. Methods. We used respondent-driven sampling (RDS) to recruit 1404 IDUs to the Aristotle intervention in August to October 2012. We interviewed participants and tested for HIV. We performed bivariate and multivariate analyses. Results. Estimated HIV prevalence was 19.8% (RDS-weighted prevalence = 14.8%). Odds of infection were 2.3 times as high in homeless as in hou ...[more]

PMID: 24524508

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Project description:Drug use involves social interactions. Therefore, norms in the proximal environment of people who inject drugs (PWID) can favor behaviors that may result in HIV transmission. This work aimed at studying drug injection-related norms and their potential association with risky behaviors among PWID in Athens, Greece, in the context of economic recession and political activism that followed the fiscal crisis and soon after a recent HIV outbreak had leveled off. The Transmission Reduction Intervention Project (TRIP) was a social network-based approach (June 2013 to July 2015) that involved two groups of PWID seeds-with recent HIV infection and with long-term HIV infection and one control group of HIV-negative PWID. Network contacts of seeds were also enrolled. TRIP participants answered a questionnaire that included items on injection-related norms and behaviors. TRIP recruited 320 PWID (HIV positive, 44.4%). TRIP participants, especially those without HIV, often recalled or perceived as normative among their partners and in their networks some behaviors that can lead to HIV transmission. TRIP participants who recalled that they were encouraged by their regular drug partners to use an unclean syringe were almost twice as likely to report that they share syringes [odds ratio (OR) = 2.03; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.86-2.21], or give syringes to someone else (OR = 1.70; 95% CI = 1.42-2.04) as those who did not recall such an encouragement. Associations were modified by HIV status. HIV negatives, who were reportedly encouraged to share nonsyringe injecting equipment, were almost 4.5 times as likely to share that material as HIV-negative participants who were not encouraged (OR = 4.59, 95% CI = 4.12-5.11). Further research is needed on the multiple determinants (social, economic, and political) of norms in the social environments of PWID. Since peer norms are associated with risky behaviors, interventions should be developed to encourage norms and peer pressure against the sharing of injection equipment.

Dataset Information

Homelessness and Other Risk Factors for HIV Infection in the Current Outbreak Among Injection Drug Users in Athens, Greece.

Publications

Homelessness and Other Risk Factors for HIV Infection in the Current Outbreak Among Injection Drug Users in Athens, Greece.

Similar Datasets

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