The Role And Importance of the Diagnostic Test in the Prevention and Control of HIV/Aids: an integrated model

Abstract

The present status of HIV/AIDS in Chile is described, together with the conditioning factors, as ascertained in national studies, of the prevention related behaviour of individuals.. Compliance with the appropriate behaviour, mainly related to condom use, has been found to be limited by cognitive and cultural factors and with the strategies of the relevant institutions. The obstacles to the prevention of HIV infection might be reduced if people had an explicit basis for considering the use of a condom as rationally indispensable in some defined situations and as unnecessary in others. To this end, a model has been developed in which the various possible situations of awareness or ignorance of infection in the couple are identified, and which incorporates the role of the HIV diagnostic test, in order to support adequate personal and institutional prevention and control practices. The expected consequences of the application of the model are discussed; among them, the separation between the technological aspects (condom, test) and the educational aspects (restraint, monogamy, sexual life plan) of the control strategy. This may avoid unnecessary arguments.