Washington, July 11 (IANS) Half the male clients of sex workers in Mexico’s Tijuana - a place with a thriving sex industry and a popular destination for US and foreign sex tourists - recently had unprotected sex besides admitting a high prevalence of drug use, says a study examining HIV infection.
“Targeted intervention among male clients is necessary to prevent the spread of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections - intervention that doesn’t solely place the onus on female sex workers,” said study co-author Thomas L. Patterson, of University of California-San Diego (UCSD) department of psychiatry and the Veterans Administration Health Care System there.

Tijuana is located in Baja California state, directly across the border from San Diego.

The study, published in the current online issue of the journal AIDS, looked at 400 clients - about half residents of San Diego and the remainder from Tijuana.

Their average age was 36.6 years, with the majority Mexican or Hispanic (about 80 percent) and single, never married or divorced (57.5 percent).

During the past year, these clients had sex with an female sex worker an average of more than 25 times and over half of them reported having unprotected sex during the past four months.

While only half of clients reported having been tested for HIV, 14.2 percent tested positive for at least one STD (chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis or HIV), said an UCSD release.

“Of those we interviewed, nearly nine out of 10 reported having used illicit drugs during their lifetime,” said Patterson. Many were binge drinkers, and one-third said they were frequently high on drugs when with a female sex worker.

The prevalence of HIV infection among clients was similar to that of female sex workers in Tijuana. The risk of contracting HIV was highest for those who lived in Mexico, used methamphetamines or had tested positive for syphilis.

While the city’s health service does licence female sex workers on condition that they are regularly tested for HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), only about half of them are indeed licensed.

Besides, Baja California has the second highest cumulative AIDS incidence of any Mexican state and, in 2006, the HIV prevalence among female sex workers in Tijuana was six percent. It has been estimated that as many as one in 112 people aged 15-49 living in Tijuana is HIV-infected.

“Male clients of female sex workers in the San Diego-Tijuana border region act as a bridge that can potentially transmit HIV and other STDs to sex partners, including their wives,” said co-author Manual Gallardo, Patronato Pro-COMUSIDA in Tijuana.

“However, given that only 59 percent of clients reported regularly using condoms with a female sex workers, there appears to be some level of complacency that urgently needs to be addressed.”

Earlier reports by UCSD researchers suggested that interactions with clients can be a critical barrier to the adaptation of safe sex practices among female sex workers, who reported that some clients are willing to pay double for unprotected sex.