Abstract

Certain subpopulations like female sex workers (FSW), men who have sex with men (MSM), and people who inject drugs (PWID) often have higher prevalence of HIV/AIDS and are difficult to map directly due to stigma, discrimination, and criminalization. Fine-scale mapping of those populations contributes to the progress toward reducing the inequalities and ending the AIDS epidemic. In 2016 and 2017, the PLACE surveys were conducted at 3290 venues in 20 out of the total 28 districts in Malawi to estimate the FSW sizes. These venues represent a presence-only dataset where, instead of knowing both where people live and do not live (presence–absence data), only information about visited locations is available. In this study, we develop a Bayesian model for presence-only data and utilize the PLACE data to estimate the FSW size and uncertainty interval at a $1.5\times 1.5$-km resolution for all of Malawi. The estimates can also be aggregated to any desirable level (city/district/region) for implementing targeted HIV prevention and treatment programs in FSW communities, which have been successful in lowering the incidence of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. Supplementary materials for this article, including a standardized description of the materials available for reproducing the work, are available as an online supplement.

摘要

女性性工作者 (FSW)、男男性行为者 (MSM) 和注射吸毒者 (PWID) 等特定亚群的艾滋病毒/艾滋病患病率通常较高，并且由于耻辱、歧视和定罪而难以直接绘制地图. 对这些人口进行精细测绘有助于在减少不平等和终结艾滋病流行方面取得进展。2016 年和 2017 年，PLACE 调查在马拉维 28 个区中的 20 个区的 3290 个场所进行，以估算 FSW 的规模。这些场所代表一个仅存在的数据集，在该数据集中，不需要知道人们居住和不居住的地方（存在-不存在数据），只有有关访问过的位置的信息可用。在这项研究中，我们为仅存在数据开发了贝叶斯模型，并利用 PLACE 数据来估计 FSW 大小和不确定性区间 $1.5\times 1.5$马拉维全境 -km 分辨率。这些估计也可以汇总到任何理想的水平（城市/地区/地区），以便在 FSW 社区实施有针对性的 HIV 预防和治疗计划，这些计划已成功降低 HIV 和其他性传播感染的发生率。本文的补充材料，包括可用于复制作品的材料的标准化描述，可作为在线补充材料获得。