Revisiting safe sex

Yves Calmette

REVISITING SAFE SEX

Background and objectives

Background

It is very timely to revisit safe sex and risk reduction

with the aim of building and updating the knowledge, skills and ability of gay men

to make informed sexual decision making choices.

Background

Background

Background

Background

Main objectives

To ensure that men gain a greater awareness of• HIV transmission, •The risks associated with non-condom based risk reduction strategies and various sexual acts,•How, why and whether risk reduction strategies work, and to what degree.

…While reinforcing the role of condoms as the cornerstone of gay men’s HIV prevention and the most assured protection against HIV transmission.

Secondary objectives

• Encourage all gay men to engage in regular HIV/STI testing.

• Educate - and encourage communication - about HIV status/viral load amongst partners.

Communication strategy

Communication strategy

• To acknowledge that men use non-condom based RRS and that the choices gay men make are ultimately up to them.

• To reinforce condom use as the primary RRS.

• To direct gay men to tailored information on a dedicated website about the level of risk involved in what they do, via a series of print posters and web banners.

CreativePrint executions

CreativeWeb banners

CreativeWebsite

Lessons learnt

Evaluation and review

•Clinically reviewed • by Dr Chris Bourne, SSHC

•Pre evaluation• External evaluation• 6 focus groups of gay men• HIV-, HIV+, Sydney, Regions, Older, Younger

Contingency plan Briefing sessions

•ACON staff • 5 sessions

•External stakeholders• Media• ASHM• SOPVs• Key community partners: Bears, SLPA, Convicts…

Q&A• Is ACON saying that gay men no longer need to use condoms? • Could this campaign increase HIV transmission by encouraging gay men to stop using condoms? • Isn’t this campaign encouraging unsafe and risky sexual practices? • Given the success of ACON’s condom reinforcement campaign in stabilising HIV transmission in

NSW, why change the message now?• The campaign states that the success of risk reduction strategies is dependent on knowing the

HIV status of one’s sexual partner/s. If a person tells you they’re HIV-negative, how can you certain that they are?

• The campaign states that the success of risk reduction strategies is dependent on sexual partners with HIV having an undetectable viral load (UDVL). Given that viral load is different in blood, semen and anal mucus, how is it possible to be certain about a sexual partner’s viral load when the only commonly available measure of it is via blood samples? Does UDVL in the blood also lower (generally speaking) your VL in other body fluids

• What about blips in VL in between the 3 month period • Q Is ACON saying it’s OK to get HIV or that HIV is no longer a big deal? • What about status unknown ! will there be information on how certain activities and length of

time since last test might mean they are now positive ?• What about the fact that different treatments have varying impact on levels of detectable VL in

different fluids • What about reinfection, New information from CROI • Will this campaign increases the rates of STI’s. Is this message the same for STI’s

Launch date: June 4

Acknowledgement

•Geoff Honnor, ACON•Dermot Ryan, ACON•Tony Tang, ACON

Thank Youycalmette@acon.org.au