From the 2024 Global Conference, held in Thessaloniki, Greece
Author: Ms. Vi Thi Tuong Vu
Background
Men who have sex with men (MSM) engaging in sexual activities under the influence of substances (chemsex) are highly vulnerability to HIV, sexually transmitted infections, and mental health issues. The HIV prevalence among MSM was reported at 10% in 2020, a ratio of 25 times higher than the general population. Nevertheless, there is limited data on chemsex as well as on its harm reduction interventions. Therefore, the study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of screening and brief chemsex (SIC) interventions compared with a combination of SIC and motivational text messages (MIM).
Methods:
A randomized controlled trial was conducted from March to July 2020 among 741 MSM who were engaged in chemsex for the past three months. Participants completed a self-report questionnaire, and trained community-based organization members carried out the brief interventions. The computer randomly assigned participants into two groups: 1)404 receiving only the SIC and 2)336 SIC, along with three MIM/ week for 12 weeks.
Results
In total, 741 MSM participated in the study, with over half (54.1%, n=400) being younger than 25 years old; 88%(n=652) completing high school or above education; 10.2% were HIV positive. Both interventions demonstrated a reduction in the frequency of chemsex engagement, decreasing from 5 times to 3 times per month. Additionally, there was a notable increase in condom use while having chemsex, from 31% to 59%. The depression rate after interventions in both SIC and SIC vs MIM showed a 21% and 17% decrease, respectively. There was no difference between the two intervention groups in the reduction rate of unsafe sexual behaviors.
Conclusions
The result indicated a reduction of unsafe chemsex in the post-intervention phase compared to pre-intervention in both groups, SIC and the combination of SIC and MIM. However, further research is needed to assess the effectiveness of the text message intervention.