Earlier this year, GMHC (of which MEN R US is part) promoted this piece of research for Public Health Institute, John Moores University and the preliminary findings are now in.
Facebook sponsored advertising was used to recruit LGBT+ people to take part in an online survey. Four adverts were used over 6 weeks (one MSM, one WSW, one trans, and one LGBT+ advert). Relevant LGBT+ organisations also advertised the survey on their social media accounts. A prize draw for a £50 Amazon voucher, or one of two runner-up prizes of £25 was used. The questionnaire was divided into three sections: demographics, sexual health and drug use, and psychological well-being.
A total of 4,690 participants started the survey, of which 1,110 did not complete the survey sufficiently to be included in analyses (n=3,676, completion rate of 78%). The median time taken to complete the survey was 12 minutes.
Preliminary findings from the LGBT+ sex and lifestyles surveyMen who have sex with men
When controlling for other factors, MSM who engaged in chemsex were more likely to live in a densely populated area (56% vs. 32%), have a larger number of condomless anal intercourse male partners, be living with HIV (20% vs. 6%), and have a low sexual self-efficacy (confidence in practicing safer sex consistently). MSM engaging in chemsex were more likely to report currently taking PrEP (30%), compared to MSM engaging in other sexualised drug use (9%), and those not engaging in any sexualised drug use (3%).
Matthew Hibbert | Sexual Health Bulletin, Autumn 2018, issue 59, pg 4-8 | Public Health Institute, John Moores University
