Sexual diversity and HIV risk among older heterosexual African American males who are seropositive

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to describe the occurrence of non-condom use during vaginal or anal intercourse, controlling for HIV symptoms, AIDS knowledge, relationship status, and safe-sex discussion, in 73 self-identified heterosexual African American males who are seropositive. The participants were analyzed as a subset from a larger sample of 130 African American men who are HIV seropositive. HIV-related symptoms were reported by all of the study participants. Twenty-seven percent of the participants reported engaging in same-sex behavior, 37% reported not using condoms during vaginal sex, and 75% reported not using condoms during anal sex during the past 3 months. Twenty-four percent did not decrease sexual risk behaviors, despite being seropositive. The logistic regression analysis indicated that the odds for participants not using condoms who did not engage in safe-sex discussions were 77.4 times for vaginal sex and 14.2 times during anal sex. These findings are compelling given that African Americans comprise 50% of new HIV infections each year.