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Councils across the South West have pooled budgets to carry out research into why certain groups are not coming forward for the HIV-preventative treatment PrEP. The findings of the exercise are now being used to run a social marketing campaign which will be tailored towards those groups and individuals who are least likely to come forward to access PrEP. PrEP is a pill which prevents infection with HIV by stopping the virus from replicating.

There are more than 100,000 living with HIV with around one in 12 unaware they have it and every year there are another 4,000 new infections.

The government has set a target of zero HIV transmissions by 2030. As part of the strategy, PrEP (Pre-exposure prophylaxis) has been made freely available to those in at-risk groupsfrom sexual health services.

PrEP is a pill which prevents infection with HIV by stopping the virus from replicating.Evidence suggests it reduces the risk of HIV infection by 86% for men who have sex with men.Since October 2020, councils have been tasked with providing PrEP through their sexual health services.

According toBHIVA/BASHH guidelines, this includes:

National campaigns have been run toraise awareness of HIV prevention, including PrEP, but by far the highest rates of use have been among white men who have sex with men.But given other groups are also at risk of acquiring HIV it soon became clear information and messages about PrEP need to get out further.

The South West Sexual Health Network became aware of this trend in late 2021 and decided to do something about it.A sub-group was established with some of the lead sexual health officers across the region and UKHSA.

Torbay Public Health Specialist SarahAston, who is on the sub-group, said: It didnt help that when councils got this responsibility we were in the middle of Covid.It was not the right time to formally launch PrEP with so many other priorities. There were also anecdotal feedback that somecampaigns that were run they didnt always resonate or connect well with other populationsin the South West.

In late 2021 we began thinking about what we could do to engage more people. One of the things that became very clear was that we did not really have a clear idea of what were the barriers and reasons for people not coming forward.

To help gather evidence, Lynn PR were appointed in January 2022 to carry out research into what was holding people back with each public health director making a contribution from their public health budgets to cover the cost.

Using social media and targeted Google ads, Lynn PR reached out to the targeted populations and carried out surveysacross the region. Nearly 750 people were engaged.The findings wereshared with the networkinmid-2022. There were a number of key insights:

The findings were really interesting and provided a lot of food for thought, said MrsAston. Different groups had very different reasons for not accessing PrEP and we realised that what was needed was a very nuanced approach that would target the right groups in the right way.

It was agreed that the 15councils which are part of the South West network would pool some of the PrEP budget to pay for a social marketing campaign. Each council set aside 3% to 6% of theirinitialPrEPallocation.

Social Change, which specialises in behavioural science, has been brought in to run the campaign.The aim is to launch it in the spring and it will initially target different groups indifferent ways, based on the initial report findings.

By later winter the thinking was that the campaign for older groups will use social media channels like Facebook as well as traditional mediums such as posters and radio advertising. The campaign will be themed around famour 1980s songs with advertising clogans such as No-one put PrEP in the corner and Sweet dreams are made of PrEP.

For the younger age group, Social Change is looking at tapping into social media favoured by these age groups such as Instagram and TikTok.

MrsAstonsaid: The bottom line is that the message is going to be sex positive that looking after your sexual health should be seen as a natural part of staying healthy. To do that we have to firstly raise awareness about PrEP and tackle some of the stigma associated with it.

sarah.aston@torbay.gov.uk

Link:
South West: Increasing Uptake of PrEP in Under-served Groups - Local Government Association