Prevalence of HIV infection and awareness of risk factors among Hani people in Honghe minority nationality prefecture, Yunnan province

Objective To understand the prevalence of HIV infection and awareness of AIDS related knowledge and risk factors among Hani people in Honghe minority nationality prefecture in Yunan province, and provide evidence for AIDS prevention and control in this population. Methods The questionnaire survey was conducted among Hani people aged 15-49 years to collect information on sociology of population, HIV/AIDS related knowledge awareness and sex behaviors, and samples of 7 ml venous blood were taken from them to detect HIV, syphilis and HSV-2 antibodies. Results Among 1001 Hani people surveyed, 61.0% were with educational level of primary school or lower, only 32.8% had learnt about AIDS. 34.2% knew three transmission routes of HIV/AIDS, 9.8% knew that HIV/AIDS can not be transmitted by usual contact, 18.2% answered the questions on the transmission of HIV/AIDS correctly, 8.8% answered all the questions about HIV/AIDS correctly, 71.4% subjects had a history of migrant working in other places, and 34.8% of them had extramarital sex. The HIV positive rate was 0.6%, syphilis positive rate was 2.9% and HSV-2 positive rate was 43.7%. Conclusion The education level of Hani people is low, and their awareness of AIDS knowledge is poor, the access to obtain AIDS-related knowledge is limited and many of them had multi sex partners. It is believed that HIV was imported into the area where Hani people live by the migrant workers among them. It is necessary to conduct health education and intervention among Hani people to prevent HIV infection.