The impacts of COVID-19 on structural inequities faced by people living with HIV who inject drugs: A qualitative study in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Abstract

People who inject drugs (PWID) living with HIV may be disproportionately impacted by pandemic restrictions. This study qualitatively explored the impacts of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic on PWID with HIV in St. Petersburg, Russia. In March and April 2021, we conducted remote, semi-structured interviews with PWID with HIV, health care providers, and harm reductionists. We interviewed 25 PWID with HIV (aged 28-56 years, 46% female) and 11 providers. The pandemic exacerbated economic and psychological challenges experienced by PWID with HIV. Simultaneously, barriers to HIV care access, ART prescription refill and dispensing and police violence, which hindered the health and safety of PWID with HIV, were themselves hindered from normal operations by the pandemic, significantly reducing these burdens. Pandemic responses should account for the unique vulnerabilities of PWID with HIV to avoid worsening the structural violence they already experience. Wherever the pandemic decreased structural barriers, such as institutional, administrative, and bureaucratic challenges and state violence enacted by police and other elements of the criminal justice system, such changes should be protected.