Association of sociodemographic factors with needle sharing and number of sex partners among people who inject drugs in Egypt

Figures & data

Table 1. Baseline sociodemographic factors and HIV risk behaviours among PWID in Cairo, Egypt.

Factor	N	Frequency (%)
Age (years)
15–24	36	13
25–34	104	38
≥35	136	49
Gender
Male	268	97
Female	8	3
Education Level
No formal education	78	28
Primary education	47	17
Preparatory education (middle school)	28	10
Secondary education (high school)	96	35
Some university education	8	3
University degree	19	7
Residential District in Greater Cairo
Shobra	174	64
Downtown	13	5
Imbabah	25	9
Other Areas	62	23
Marital Status
Currently married ^a	85	31
Not currently married	188	69
Employment Status ^b
Employed	122	45
Unemployed	147	55
Ever Shared Needles or Syringes
Yes	205	74
No	71	26
Shared Needles or Syringes in Last Month
Yes	174	87
No	27	13
Reuse Needles or Syringes
Yes	236	86
No	37	14
Frequency of Injection Last Month
Non-Daily	47	17
Daily	229	83
# of Sex Partners in the Past 6 Months
≥2	64	32
0–1	138	68
# of Sex Partners in the Past 12 Months
≥2	141	53
0–1	127	47
Ever Had Sex for Money
Yes	33	20
No	134	80
Condom Use with Irregular Partners in the Past 6 Months
Never	223	94
Sometimes	12	5
Always	2	1
Condom Use with Regular Partners in the Past 6 Months
Never	227	96
Sometimes	7	3
Always	2	1

Data from baseline visits occurred from December 2013-December 2017 at an outreach centre in Cairo, Egypt.

Variables may have different denominators due to missing data.

^a Only two PWID were married to more than one partner.

^b Does not include PWID who reported being students (n=6).

Table 2. Sociodemographic factors and sharing needles/syringes in the month prior to the baseline visit among PWID in Egypt.

	Shared needles or syringes last month (N = 175)	Did not share needles or syringes last month (N = 27)	Crude OR (95% Cl)	Adjusted OR (aOR) (95% CI)^a
Age (years)
15–24	18 (95%)	1 (5%)	-	-
25–34	66 (87%)	10 (13%)	0.4 (0.0-3.1)	0.3 (0.0-2.5)
≥35	91 (85%)	16 (15%)	0.3 (0.0-2.5)	0.2 (0.0-2.2)
Education Level^b
Preparatory or less education	93 (85%)	16 (15%)	-	-
Secondary or more education	82 (88%)	11 (12%)	1.3 (0.6-2.9)	1.5 (0.6-3.7)
Residential District in Greater Cairo
Shobra	104 (90%)	12 (10%)	-	-
Downtown	11 (92%)	1 (8%)	1.3 (0.2-10.7)	2.2 (0.2-22.4)
Imbabah	17 (85%)	3 (15%)	0.7 (0.2-2.6)	1.0 (0.2-4.5)
Other	41 (79%)	11 (21%)	0.4 (0.2-1.1)	0.5 (0.2-1.3)
Marital Status
Currently married ^c	66 (93%)	5 (7%)	2.6 (0.9-7.1)	4.3 (1.4-13.1)
Not currently married	108 (84%)	21 (16%)	-	-
Employment Status ^d
Employed	61 (78%)	17 (22%)	-	-
Unemployed	111 (92%)	10 (8%)	3.1 (1.3-7.2)	3.9 (1.5-10.3)

CI = confidence interval, OR = odds ratio.

Data from baseline visits occurred from December 2013-December 2017 in Cairo, Egypt.

^a Adjusted odds ratio (aOR) values were adjusted for the other variables included in the multivariate model (age, education level, residential district, marital status, employment status) and presented in the table.

^b Clients with ‘preparatory or less education’ include those who either had not received formal education, had a primary education or preparatory education. Clients with ‘secondary or more education’ included those who had a secondary education, university education or held a university degree. Education level was dichotomised from Table 1.

^c Only two PWID were married to more than one partner.

^d Student PWID (n=3) were excluded.

Table 3. Sociodemographic factors and baseline number of sex partners in the past six months among PWID in Egypt.

	≥2 Sex partners in past 6 months (N = 64)	0–1 Sex partner in past 6 months (N = 138)	≥2 vs 0–1 Sex partner in past 6 months crude OR (95% Cl)	≥2 vs 0–1 sex partner in past 6 months aOR (95% CI)^a
Age (years)
15–24	9 (53%)	8 (47%)	-	-
25–34	25 (30%)	58 (70%)	0.4 (0.1-1.1)	0.5 (0.2-1.6)
≥35	30 (29%)	72 (71%)	0.4 (0.1-1.1)	0.6 (0.2-1.8)
Gender
Male	61 (31%)	137 (69%)	-	-
Female	3 (75%)	1 (25%)	6.7 (0.7-66.1)	8.3 (0.7-93.3)
Education Level
Preparatory or less education	44 (36%)	79 (64%)	-	-
Secondary or more education	20 (25%)	59 (75%)	0.6 (0.3-1.1)	0.6 (0.3-1.1)
Residential District in Greater Cairo
Shobra	38 (29%)	93 (71%)	-	-
Downtown	3 (27%)	8 (73%)	0.9 (0.2-3.6)	0.8 (0.2-3.4)
Imbabah	5 (28%)	13 (72%)	0.9 (0.3-2.8)	0.7 (0.2-2.4)
Other	18 (44%)	23 (56%)	1.9 (0.9-3.9)	1.8 (0.8-4.0)
Marital Status
Currently married^b	16 (25%)	47 (75%)	0.6 (0.3-1.3)	0.6 (0.3-1.3)
Not currently married	48 (35%)	91 (65%)	-	-
Employment Status^c
Employed	29 (33%)	59 (67%)	-	-
Unemployed	33 (29%)	79 (71%)	0.9 (0.5-1.6)	0.8 (0.4-1.5)

CI = confidence interval, OR = odds ratio.

Data from baseline visits occurred from December 2013-December 2017 in Cairo, Egypt.

^a Adjusted odds ratio (aOR) values were adjusted for the other variables included in the multivariate model (age, gender, education level, residential district, marital status, employment status) and presented in the table.

^b Only two PWID were married to more than one partner.

^c Student PWID (n=1) were excluded.

Table 4. Sociodemographic factors and stopping sharing needles/syringes from baseline to follow-up among PWID in Egypt.

Sociodemographic factors at baseline visit	Stopped sharing needles or syringes after VCT (N = 90)	Continued sharing needles or syringes after VCT (N = 58)	Unadjusted (crude) Odds Ratio (OR) (95% CI)^a	Adjusted Odds Ratio (aOR) (95% CI)^b
Age
15–24	5 (38%)	8 (62%)	-	-
25–34	40 (68%)	19 (32%)	3.4 (0.97-11.7)	3.2 (0.7-13.9)
≥35	45 (59%)	31 (41%)	2.3 (0.7-7.8)	2.5 (0.6-11.1)
Education Level
Preparatory or less education	43 (55%)	35 (45%)	-	-
Secondary or more education	47 (67%)	23 (33%)	1.7 (0.9-3.2)	1.6 (0.8-3.5)
Residential District in Greater Cairo
Shobra	63 (72%)	25 (28%)	-	-
Downtown	5 (50%)	5 (50%)	0.4 (0.1-1.5)	0.4 (0.1-1.9)
Imbabah	8 (57%)	6 (43%)	0.5 (0.2-1.7)	0.5 (0.1-1.7)
Other	12 (35%)	22 (65%)	0.2 (0.1-0.5)	0.2 (0.1-0.5)
Marital Status
Currently married^c	28 (50%)	28 (50%)	0.5 (0.2-0.96)	0.4 (0.2-0.8)
Not currently married	62 (67%)	30 (33%)	-	-
Employment Status^d
Employed	27 (53%)	24 (47%)	-	-
Unemployed	62 (65%)	33 (35%)	1.7 (0.8-3.3)	0.8 (0.4-2.0)

CI = confidence interval, OR = odds ratio.

Data from baseline and follow-up visits occurred from December 2013-December 2017 among male PWID in Cairo, Egypt.

^a The odds ratio represents positive behaviour change where PWID shared needles/syringes last month at baseline visit but did not share needles/syringes last month at follow-up visit. The comparison group included PWID who shared needles/syringes at both visits.

^b Adjusted odds ratio (aOR) values were adjusted for the other variables included in the multivariate model (age, education level, residential district, marital status, employment status) and presented in the table.

^c Only one PWID was married to more than one partner.

^d Student PWID (n=2) were excluded.

Data availability statement

Data can be made available to other researchers with appropriate approvals in place. Interested parties should contact Emad Helmy ([email protected]), member of the Ethics Committee at the Freedom Programme for more information.