Behavioural risk factors for acquisition of HIV infection and knowledge about AIDS among male professional blood donors in Delhi.

In 1989-90 a study was carried out in Delhi of the risk behaviours and epidemiological characteristics exhibited by 15 paid blood donors who were positive for human immunodeficiency (HIV) virus and on 100 paid seronegative donors. All the donors were male. Compared with the seronegative donors, a significantly greater proportion of seropositive donors were unmarried, had lived in at least two cities in the previous 5 years, donated blood at least once per month, were heterosexually promiscuous, and had visited a clinic for sexually transmitted diseases. Awareness about acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) was poor, and even those donors who had heard of AIDS were ignorant about certain important aspects. The results indicate that, based on the risk factors identified in this study, there is a need to adopt more careful selection criteria for blood donors in India.