Prevalence and Incidence of HIV Among Out-of-Treatment Injecting Drug Users, Chicago 1994???1996

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Abstract
Evaluation of HIV vaccines requires high-risk individuals willing to participate in a vaccine trial. We investigated the willingness to participate in HIV vaccine trials of initially HIV-seronegative homosexual men enrolled in an HIV seroincidence cohort study. Of 815 initially HIV-seronegative participants, 569 (69.8%) reported willingness to participate in an HIV vaccine trial. Altruism was the primary reason given for wanting to participate. Fear of HIV infection from the study's immunizations and a vaccine-induced positive HIV test result were the main reasons for not wanting to participate. Of the 34 study subjects who eventually had HIV seroconversion, 29 (85%) had indicated a willingness to participate. In a univariate analysis, factors associated with willingness to participate included HIV seroconversion during followup (odds ratio [OR]. 2.6; p = .04), low educational level (OR, 1.6; p = .005), low family income (p = .02), and exchanging sex for housing, food, or clothing (OR 6.1; p = .005). Students were less likely to be willing to participate in a trial (OR, 0.7; p = .03), as well as those who reported sex at the first encounter (OR, 0.7; p = .05). In a multivariate analysis, low education level, infection with Condyloma, and exchanging sex for housing, food, or clothing were positively associated with willingness to participate, whereas being a student and reporting sex at first encounter were negatively associated. In general, factors indicative of high-risk of HIV infection were associated with a higher willingness. These data demonstrate that this high-risk homosexual male cohort has a high willingness to participate in HIV vaccine trials. *Infectious Diseases Service, Hospital Universitário Clementino Fraga Filho; Department of Preventive Medicine, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; and Infectious Diseases Epidemiology Research Unit, Departments of Epidemiology and Medicine, University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health and School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S.A. Address correspondence and reprint requests to Lee Harrison, Infectious Diseases Epidemiology Research Unit, University of Pittsburgh, 521 Parran Hall, 130 DeSoto Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15261 U.S.A.; e-mail: [email protected] Manuscript received May 4, 2000; accepted October 2, 2000. © 2000 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Inc.