Auvert, B., Buve, A., Lagarde, E., Kahindo, M., Chege, J...

来自 : www.oalib.com/references/7970. 发布时间：2021-03-25

Background: The extentof the differential spread of HIV around the world remains incompletelyexplained. This paper examines the extent to which five explanatory variables(circumcision prevalence, condom usage, STI treatment coverage, number of sexpartners, partner concurrency) are correlated with peak HIV prevalence rates ata country level. Methods: We performed linear regression analysis to measurethe association between each of the independent variables and the national peakHIV prevalence rates for 15 - 49 years old. Results: Our analysis shows astrong positive association between peak HIV prevalence and the prevalence ofpartner concurrency (rho = 0.853; P = 0.001). There was no association betweenpeak HIV prevalence and circumcision prevalence (rho = 0.118; P = 0.161),condom usage (rho = 0.048; P = 0.794), STI treatment coverage (rho = 0.143; P =0.136) and number of sex partners (rho = 0.134; P = 0.298) at a global level.There was however a strong negative association between peak HIV prevalence andcircumcision prevalence when the analysis was limited to countries within subSaharan Africa (rho = -0.659; P = 0.000). Sub Saharan Africa had the second andthird highest circumcision rates in the world when the circumcision prevalencethresholds were set at 80% and 20% respectively. Conclusions: Differences inthe prevalence of circumcision likely influence differential peak HIV prevalencewithin sub Saharan Africa but are implausible causes for the higher HIV prevalencein this region. The close association found between concurrency and HIVprevalence requires replication in further studies.