Abstract
BackgroundChina has 76.2 million high school and college students, in which the number of reported HIV/AIDS cases is increasing rapidly. Most of these cases are attributed to male-to-male sexual contact. Few studies have explored HIV prevalence and behavioural characteristics of Chinese male students who have sex with men (MSM).MethodsA cross-sectional study of MSM high school and college students in Liaoning Province was conducted. Data were collected through face-to-face interviews and blood specimens were obtained and tested for HIV and syphilis.ResultsThere were 436 eligible participants. HIV and syphilis prevalence was 3.0% and 5.0%, respectively. In multivariate analysis, sexual orientation known by family members (OR: 7.3; 95% CI: 1.5-34.6), HIV/AIDS information obtained from clinical doctors (OR: 6.7; 95% CI: 1.7-25.9), HIV/AIDS information obtained through free educational services and materials such as voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) and condom distribution services (OR: 0.2; 95% CI: 0.4-1.0), inconsistent condom use (OR: 5.7; 95%: 1.3-25.3), sexual partner experienced anal bleeding after insertive anal intercourse (OR: 6.8; 95% CI: 1.6-28.4), and history of illegal drug use (OR: 18.9; 95% CI: 2.2-165.3) were found to be significantly associated with HIV infection.ConclusionsGreater effort should be made towards stemming the HIV and syphilis epidemics among Chinese student MSM. Immediate screening and comprehensive interventions towards student MSM should be implemented in order to curb the spread of HIV. Family and school-based interventions should be considered to target this educated, yet vulnerable, population.
Highlights
China has 76.2 million high school and college students, in which the number of reported HIV/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) cases is increasing rapidly
Sexual orientation known by family members (OR: 7.3; 95% confidence intervals (CI): 1.5-34.6), HIV/AIDS information obtained from clinical doctors (OR: 6.7; 95% CI: 1.7-25.9), HIV/AIDS information obtained through free educational services and materials such as voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) and condom distribution programs (OR: 0.2; 95% CI: 0.4-1.0), inconsistent condom use (OR: 5.7; 95%: 1.325.3), sexual partner experienced anal bleeding after insertive anal intercourse (OR: 6.8; 95% CI: 1.6-28.4), and history of illegal drug use (OR: 18.9; 95% CI: 2.2-165.3) were found to be significant associated for HIV infection
The HIV prevalence among this group of Liaoning student men who have sex with men (MSM) was 3.0%, which is over fifty times higher than the Chinese general population (0.057%) [3]
Summary
China has 76.2 million high school and college students, in which the number of reported HIV/AIDS cases is increasing rapidly. Most of these cases are attributed to male-to-male sexual contact. Few studies have explored HIV prevalence and behavioural characteristics of Chinese male students who have sex with men (MSM). Several recent studies of Chinese MSM found that between 27.9%-72.3% of MSM study participants were college educated [8,9], which is significantly higher than the percentage of higher education among other high-risk groups in China including female sex workers (6.4-7.1%) [10,11] and injection drug users (0.0-8.1%) [12,13]. While Chinese students are generally not considered to be at high risk for HIV [2], only a few studies with small samples sizes have been conducted to analyze the risk behaviours for HIV infection among Chinese student MSM [14,15,16]
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