Drug use, AIDS knowledge, and HIV risk behaviors of Cuban-, Mexican-, and Puerto-Rican-born drug injectors who are recent entrants into the United States

To date, relatively little research attention has been devoted to the HIV-r isky behaviors of persons who are newly arrived in the United States and wh o use drugs. Data gathered from street-recruited injection drug users (IDUs ) recruited in 10 United States cities who were born in Mexico, Cuba, and P uerto Rico and who are recent entrants into the United States suggest that, in comparison to US-born IDUs, Mexican-born subjects are at elevated risk for acquiring and transmitting HIV as a result of sharing needles with frie nds and running partners; sharing drug injection implements such as cookers , cotton, and rinse water; frequent injection in HIV-risky settings; use of unsterilized needles; and relatively frequent trading of sex for drugs or money. Puerto-Rican-born IDUs were found to inject drugs relatively frequen tly, and to do so relatively often in high-risk settings in which sterile i njecting equipment and cleaning materials often are scarce. These data also show generally lower levels of-AIDS knowledge among the in-migrant IDUs th an among US-born IDUs. Respondents from each nationality group most often c ited television as the source of their most useful and reliable AIDS inform ation, but also tended to regard community outreach workers as a significan t source of reliable AIDS and needle cleaning information. The high levels of involvement in HIV-risky behaviors, deficits in knowledge concerning the means of HIV transmission, and relative ease of mobility of the at-risk (f or HIV) individuals examined here indicate a need for a comprehensive publi c health prevention initiative to limit the future spread of HIV. At a mini mum, such an undertaking would do well to incorporate group-specific, cultu rally appropriate behavioral interventions as well as an information campai gn.