Dr. Amanda E. Tanner (Public Health Education) received a continuation of funding from Wake Forest University Health Sciences for the project “Evaluating Locally-Developed or Adapted (Homegrown) Combination HIV Prevention Interventions for Transgender Persons who have Sex with Men.”
The southern United States (U.S.) is experiencing disproportionate HIV and STD infection rates compared to other regions of the country and has been referred to as the “new” and “latest” U.S. HIV epicenter. 21 of the 25 U.S. cities and major metropolitan areas with the highest rates of new infections per capita are in the South and the majority of all new U.S. AIDS diagnoses occur in this region. Latinas/os in the U.S. are disproportionately affected by HIV and STDs – they have the second highest rate of AIDS diagnosis of all racial/ethnic groups and 3 times the rate of new cases of non-Latino whites. Rates of gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis are 2-4 times as high among Latinos as among non-Latino whites. Latina/o transgender persons carry even more burden.
Further, in many Southern states, including North Carolina (NC), consistently lead the U.S. in reported cases of AIDS, gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis. In NC, HIV incidence rates are 40% higher than the national rate, and HIV and STD infection rates for Latinos are 3 and 4 times that of non-Latino whites. Compared to Latinos in traditional settlement states with longer histories of Latino immigration, including US-Mexico border states (e.g., AZ, CA, and TX), Latinos in new settlement states are more likely to be from rural southern Mexico and Central America; report lower educational attainment; and have arrived more recently without families.
New settlement states lack developed infrastructures to meet Latinos’ needs (e.g., limited bilingual/bicultural services) and tend to be more hostile towards Latinos. Accordingly, the goals of this study are to refine, fully implement, and rigorously evaluate the effectiveness of a locally developed and culturally congruent combination HIV prevention intervention designed to reduce the disproportionate HIV burden borne by Latina/o transgender persons who have sex with men and increase their access to and use of transition-related healthcare services.
