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Abstract
Background The objective of this paper is to review literature in order to calculate regional estimates of the average duration of time individuals maintain a specific high-risk behaviour.
Methods The review targeted the key populations of female sex workers (FSW), male clients of female sex workers (MCFSW), people who inject drugs (injecting drug users (IDU)) and high-risk men who have sex with men (MSM). To be included in the review the study had to provide information on (1) the time a person spent at risk until death or cessation of the risk behaviour, (2) the percentage of the sample who initiated the risk behaviour in less than a year or (3) the mean or median duration of the behaviour from a representative sample.
Results 49 papers were found for the FSW population describing the period of time FSW stay in sex work to be between 2.9 years (Asia) and 12 years (Latin America). Eight papers were found for MCFSW showing the duration of the risk behaviour in this category varying from 4.6 years in Africa to 32 years in Asia. 86 papers were reviewed for the population of IDU showing that the average time a person injects illegal drugs varies from 5.6 years (Africa) to 21 years (South America). No information was found for duration of high-risk behaviour among MSM; instead, the definitions found in the literature for high- and low-risk behaviour among MSM were described.
Conclusions There is high variability of estimates of duration of high-risk behaviours at regional level. More research is needed to inform models and prevention programmes on the average duration of time individuals maintain a specific high-risk behaviour.
- Injecting Drug Use
- Prostitution
- HIV
- Gay Men
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Supplementary Data
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Footnotes
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Contributions EF: Conception and design of the study, acquisition of data, analysis and interpretation of data, article draft, paper review for important intellectual content, final approval of the version to be published. PC and MM: Conception and design of the study, analysis and interpretation of data, paper review for important intellectual content, final approval of the version to be published. TB: Interpretation of data, paper review for important intellectual content, final approval of the version to be published.
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Competing interests None.
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Provenance and peer review Commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
Open Access This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 3.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/