title: Short communication: Prioritizing communities for HIV prevention in sub-Saharan Africa.
abstract: HIV prevalence is the most commonly used measure to prioritize communities for HIV prevention. We show that data on two HIV infection stages (early vs. nonearly and late vs. nonlate) allow estimation of two better measures of prevention need: HIV incidence (for prevention of HIV acquisition) and expected probability of HIV transmission in unprotected sex acts between HIV-infected community members and susceptible individuals (for prevention of HIV transmission). The three ranking schemes--by prevalence, incidence, and transmission probability--lead to significantly different community rank orders. Disease stage information should be collected in HIV surveys.
authors.affiliation: Department of Global Health and Population, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, USA. tbarnighausen@africacentre.ac.za
authors.forename: Till
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Bärnighausen
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Tanser
authors.forename: Timothy
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hallett
authors.forename: Marie-Louise
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Newell
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D017954:Africa South of the Sahara / Q000453:epidemiology; D018672:Community Health Planning / Q000379:methods*; D003153:Community Health Services; D005260:Female; D006678:HIV; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000635:transmission; D006292:Health Priorities; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015995:Prevalence; D047568:Unsafe Sex