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Albert Mudingayi, Prosper Lutala, Bavon Mupenda. HIV knowledge and sexual risk behavior among street adolescents in rehabilitation centres in Kinshasa, DRC: gender differences. The Pan African Medical Journal. 2011;10:23 Key words: Condoms, Knowledge, Sexual risk behavior, street children, Kinshasa, Congo Permanent link: http://www.panafrican-med-journal.com/content/article/10/23/full Received: 27/04/2011 - Accepted: 27/08/2011 - Published: 17/10/2011 © Albert Mudingayi et al. The Pan African Medical Journal - ISSN 1937-8688. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
HIV knowledge and sexual risk behavior among street adolescents in rehabilitation centres in Kinshasa; DRC: gender differences
Albert Mudingayi1, Prosper Lutala2,&, Bavon Mupenda3
1Reproductive Health Centre for Youths and Teenagers Bomoto. Christian Church in Congo, Kinshasa, DRC, 2Département de Médecine de Famille, Faculté de Médecine, Université de Goma, République Démocratique du Congo, 3Centre Interdisciplinaire de Bioéthique pour l’Afrique Francophone, Ecole de santé publique, Faculté de Médecine, Université de Kinshasa, République Démocratique du Congo
&Corresponding author
Prosper Lutala, UNDP-UNV P.O. Box 30 135 Lilongwe 3 Malawi
Street children, common in Africa, are increasingly vulnerable to alcohol and drugs of abuse and lack access to both healthcare and knowledge about HIV and AIDS. Hence, this study assessed the level of knowledge about sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV, among street adolescents in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
A random sampling of 200 street children (10-25 years of age) were selected from 17 rehabilitation centres in Kinshasa, and a structured questionnaire was administered to all participants in their respective centres. High knowledge, knowledge or awareness of condom was defined when a participant gave more than 67% of correct responses. Chi square analysis was used to test differences between sexes.
The knowledge level of respondents was high. 54.3% of males and 45.7% of girls have heard about HIV), and few participants cited unprotected sex as mode of transmission (42.9% for males and 57.1% for females). A high number of children reported a previous sexual experience. Satisfying a natural bodily need was the main reason for having sex. However, the use of condoms is still low in both genders (26.2 versus 59.3%, p<0.01). Neither gender reported a reason why they are not using a condom.
This study highlights the high knowledge about HIV, which contrasts with low condom use and high past sexual experiences with the high number of sexual partners and sexual contacts. Policies targeting these findings are warranted to reverse such trends.
