Truck Drivers and Casual Sex : An Inquiry into the Potential Spread of HIV/AIDS in the Baltic Region

Kulis, Marzena ; Chawla, Mukesh ; Kozierkiewicz, Adam ; Subata, Emilis

Washington, DC:World Bank

关键词: ACQUIRED IMMUNE DEFICIENCY SYNDROME;    HIV INFECTIONS;    COMMERCIAL SEX WORKERS;    NONGOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS;    VENEREAL DISEASES;   

DOI  :  10.1596/0-8213-5894-4
RP-ID  :  29891

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This study, perhaps the first of itskind in this region, is based on a study that explores thepractice of casual sex among truck drivers, and commercialsex workers in the border areas of the Baltic region at apoint of time, and, uses this evidence to extrapolate thepotential impact on the spread of HIV/AIDS in thesecountries. While the threat of an HIV/AIDS epidemic cannotbe taken lightly in any country of the Europe and CentralAsia region, four countries - Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, andEstonia - stand out as being particularly vulnerable. First,the prevalence of HIV/AIDS is relatively high, and israpidly increasing in locations neighboring these countriesto the east, like Ukraine, Kaliningrad, Belarus, andMoldova, where public health conditions are also rapidlydeteriorating. Second, because of their geographicallocation, those four countries stand at the crossroads ofthe main east-west, and north-south transport corridors, andrepresent the link between countries of the former SovietUnion and western Europe. The open borders, and rapidtransit threatens to broaden the sweep of the HIV epidemic,as drug injectors and sex workers come into contact withother population groups. After the Introduction whichprovides background, Section 2 reviews similar studiescarried out elsewhere in the world. Section 3 describes themethodology employed in this study, followed by a briefdescription of the data in Section 4. Finally, Section 5contains a discussion of the results, and policy implications.