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Sexual Partner Choice in Injecting Drg Users
It is thus possible, from these data, to estimate a one-year
proportional percentage for at-risk activities in this sam pIe by
providing data on the proportional percentage of sexual contacts in
IDUs as well as number of partners. The small number of cases who
reported no sexual contact in the past year (less than 5%) suggests that
these estima tes are reasonably accu rate although deady the
proportion of non-sexually active respondents must be taken into
account in estimation of HIV infection risk. A knowledge of the
distribution of partner type and number is essential to estimating HIV
spread from and within IDUs, particularly to heterosexual persons
with no other risk factors. However, a knowledge of the precise HIV
infection risk is also needed, and this would involve not only a
description of the type of sexual partner, but also the precise nature of
the sexual interaction on the last sexual encounter. We do not have
such data for this sample. Co-factors, such as STDs, and the fact that
intoxication during sexual activity is commonly reported for IDUs,
will also affect HIV transmission and the probability of safer sex.
ln addition to the advantages of more accurate estimation of the risk
of HIV transmission among and from IDUs, there are two further
significant advantages in the method used in this study. The use of a
"critical incident" as opposed to a general recollection of sexual
behaviour is more likely to aid ace urate recall of incidents past by
seeking recall of the context and actors in a specifie interaction.
Second, in an epidemiological sense, it can act, in a sufficiently large
sample, to give a proportional estima te of the distribution of
behaviours. To use this, additional information on frequency of such
behaviours within a specifie period as well as partner numbers is
required. Temporal distribution of sexual behaviour must also be
taken into account, as there are large seasonal distributions in STD
rates which suggest that sexual behaviour is not evenly distributed
across the year. Using last and second-Iast contacts in a sufficiently
large and hopefully as representative as possible a sample can also
provide an index of reliability or stability of the behaviours being
investigated as weIl as data on context.
ln summary, these data both demonstrate the use of a "critical
incident" (proportional percentage) measure to identify as accurately
as possible the distribution of types of individuals with whom sexual
behaviours are engaged in, and the relative stability of such data by
using as a comparison the previous sexual encounter. These data
suggest that the difference between male and female IDUs in terms of
IDU partners is not as great as has previously been estimated, and that,
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