High-risk behaviors and beliefs and knowledge about HIV transmission among school and shelter children in Eastern Europe.
OBJECTIVE
The goal of this study was to determine sexual behavior, injecting drug use, knowledge and representations of HIV transmission among adolescents in Russia, Georgia, and the Ukraine.


METHODS
We conducted semistructured interviews on sexual behavior and structured inventories assessing knowledge of HIV transmission, sexual behavior and drug use, and social representations of the epidemic.


RESULTS
Shelter children are more likely than school children to have had sex and injected drugs. Georgian school children are more likely than the other school children to have sex and inject drugs. Shelter children and Georgians are the most likely to hold mistaken representations about the epidemic.


CONCLUSIONS
Particular groups (Russian and Ukrainian shelter children, Georgian school children) urgently require education about the risks of HIV/AIDS.
Goodwin
Robin
R
Department of Human Sciences, Brunel University, Uxbridge, UK. robin.goodwin@brunel.ac.uk
Kozlova
Alexandra
A
Nizharadze
George
G
Polyakova
Galina
G
D000293:Adolescent; D005061:Europe, Eastern / Q000453:epidemiology; D005260:Female; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000209:etiology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D006266:Health Education; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006703:Ill-Housed Persons; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008297:Male; D012307:Risk Factors; D012309:Risk-Taking; D013334:Students; D015819:Substance Abuse, Intravenous