Behavioural Practices Associated with Occurrence of HIV among University Students in Ghana

Background: Achieving zero HIV infection would require the thorough understanding of the prevalence of HIV and high risk behaviours among most-at-risk groups such as student populations in order to determine what interventional measures would be most appropriate to use. This study was, therefore, undertaken to determine Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) students’ HIV sero-status in order to know their HIV prevalence in relation to their attitude, perception and knowledge of HIV/AIDS, their knowledge of sex and sexuality as well as their understanding of HIV-related stigmatization. This was to enable the development of specific effective and targeted HIV-prevention interventional programme aimed at preventing HIV infection among the KNUST student population.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional study carried out at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). We structurally surveyed some of the students’ knowledge and understanding of HIV/AIDS, sex and sexuality and HIV-related stigmatization and their HIV prevalent rate through a 48-item questionnaire administration and HIV antibody testing. HIV antibody status was determined by the serological testing for HIV antibodies in their blood using Abbott Determine HIV 1/2 kit for first line screening and OraQuick HIV 1 & 2 kit for the confirmatory testing.

Results: Results obtained revealed that the students of KNUST surveyed had adequate knowledge about HIV transmission and its associated risk factors though they actively engaged in HIV transmission risky behaviours such as premarital sex and sex with multiple and/or casual partners. This notwithstanding, all the 754 students who participated in this study as well as the 4,085 student population who underwent HIV testing all tested negative.

Conclusion: The observation that the HIV prevalent rate among the students studied is zero could be that those students may be those, who as a result of their lifestyle, were confident that their HIV status would be negative. This observation, notwithstanding the HIV transmission risky behaviours that the students studied may be engaging in, may be due to the higher education these students may be getting.