NCJ Number
129077
Journal
AIDS and Public Policy Journal Volume: 5 Issue: 3 Dated: (Summer 1990) Pages: 17-18
Date Published
1990
Length
2 pages
Annotation
A 3-year National AIDS Demonstration and Research (NADR) project conducted in Houston, beginning in 1987, collected information on 3,000 intravenous drug users and their sexual partners as part of an effort to control the spread of AIDS among that population. Data collection, consisting of routine ethnographic project evaluation and in-depth interviews, took place in 3 geographically and culturally distinct communities.
Abstract
Respondents were asked about their knowledge of AIDS and how AIDS is discussed among their drug-using friends. Without exception, they indicated that their prime source of information about AIDS was the Houston NADR project. Although all respondents believed that AIDS is a killer disease, they expressed several attitudes typical of intravenous drug users, namely that knowledge of AIDS is not normally communicated among friends and sexual partners, that expressing knowledge about AIDS is often a stigma, and that, when AIDS is discussed, it is usually done through jokes or myth telling. 12 references