Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1996. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
San Francisco Chronicle - The Voice of the West, 901 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA 94119 - Wednesday, August 14, 1996 - Page A16
David Tuller, Chronicle Staff Writer
The Center for AIDS Prevention Studies at the University of California at San Francisco conducted the study between 1993 and 1995. It involved 242 gay and bisexual men ages 18 to 27 participating in eight-month prevention programs in Santa Barbara and Eugene, Ore.
In the past couple of years, AIDS researchers and educators have expressed alarm about high rates of unprotected anal intercourse among young gay and bisexual men. They have attributed the phenomenon to a host of psychological factors, such as young people's perceived sense of immortality and a sense among gay men that becoming infected is inevitable.
In each city participating in the center's study, the HIV-prevention programs were run by young gay men and included the creation of a community center, discussion groups and informal outreach at gay events. Researchers interviewed all the participants twice before the program started and twice after it ended.
In interviews conducted two months after the program ended, the researchers found a 26 percent reduction in unprotected anal sex with casual partners and a 28 percent reduction with boyfriends. Interviews conducted one year later indicated that although participants resumed having unsafe sex with boyfriends, they sustained the reduction in unsafe sex with casual partners.
"Since new young men will continue to come out as gay each year, it is critical that there be an ongoing system to socialize them about the need for safer sex," said one of the researchers, Susan Kegeles, in a statement. "Additional efforts need to focus on risk reduction among boyfriends."
The study's release coincides with the start of a new safe sex campaign for young gay and bisexual men in San Francisco. The campaign designed by Q Action, the young men's program of the Stop AIDS Project, is called "The Moment."
According to David Boyer, the campaign's creative director, it focuses on "those few passionate and critical seconds during sex when a person makes a final decision to be safe or unsafe."
The campaign includes billboards, brochures and ads in club bathrooms, as well as discussion groups and social events organized to address the issue.
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