BACKGROUND Hepatitis C virus (HCV) causes significant morbidity and mortality in injecting drug users (IDU) worldwide. HCV vaccine candidates have shown promise for reducing the infectivity of acute infection and averting chronic infection, yet the impact of varying levels of vaccine efficacy and vaccine delivery strategies on the HCV epidemic in IDU have not been explored. METHODS We utilize...

The authors explored an age-specific back-calculation approach to estimating long-term trends in the incidence and prevalence of opiate use/injecting drug use (IDU) in England for 1968-2000. The incidence of opiate use/IDU was estimated by combining information on the observed opiate overdose deaths of persons aged 15-44 years with knowledge on the distribution of the time between starting opia...

PURPOSE OF REVIEW Oral preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP) has shown HIV preventive efficacy for several key populations at risk for HIV infection including MSM and heterosexual men and women in HIV serodiscordant relationships. An efficacy trial of daily oral tenofovir among people who inject drugs (IDU) is underway in Thailand. RECENT FINDINGS Although efficacy data is pending, there is emerging...

People who inject drugs (PWID) are at risk for infective endocarditis (IE). Hospitalization rates related to misuse of prescription opioids and heroin have increased in recent years, but there are no recent investigations into rates of hospitalizations from injection drug use-related IE (IDU-IE). Using the Health Care and Utilization Project National Inpatient Sample (HCUP-NIS) dataset, we foun...

BACKGROUND The aim of this study was to describe the extent of the HIV epidemic among women in the Republic of Georgia and to identify factors associated with HCV co-infection in this population. FINDINGS All women aged ≥18 years who were diagnosed with HIV between 1989 and 2006 were identified through the National HIV/AIDS surveillance database. Medical records were reviewed for demographic ...

INTRODUCTION AND AIMS Thailand's longstanding HIV epidemic among injection drug users (IDU) has been attributed, in part, to the Thai government's unwillingness to implement evidence-based HIV prevention interventions. This study was undertaken to examine risk factors for syringe borrowing among a community-recruited sample of Thai IDU. DESIGN AND METHODS We examined the prevalence of syringe...

The HIV epidemic in Manipur, the highest HIV prevalence state of India, is primarily driven by injecting drug use. Reliable estimate of population size of injecting drug users (IDU) is critical for aiding HIV prevention program in the state to combat drug driven HIV epidemic. The study described multiplier method, an indirect technique of estimation of IDU size in five districts of Manipur, Ind...

OBJECTIVES We describe the characteristics of injecting drug users (IDU) in Pakistan in 2006 and 2011, and assess the heterogeneity of IDU characteristics across different cities and years as well as factors associated with HIV infection. METHODS Cross-sectional, integrated behavioural-biological surveys of IDU were conducted in 10 cities across Pakistan in 2006 and 2011. Univariate and multi...