ECONOMIC DISPARITY ASSOCIATED WITH RECEPTIVE SYRINGE SHARING IN PEOPLE WHO INJECT DRUGS IN TEHRAN: BLINDER-OAXACA DECOMPOSITION ANALYSIS

Background and Aim : The present study set to describe the socioeconomic inequality associated with receptive syringe sharing in people who inject drugs (PWID) in Tehran city, the capital of Iran.Methods : The cross-sectional study was conducted in 2016-2017, among 500 PWID in Tehran. PWIDs were recruited by a convenience sampling recruitment at local NSP Drop-in Centers (DIC) and through snowball sampling .Using principle component analysis, the socioeconomic status of participants was categorized to two groups. The determinants of this inequality were determined by the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition. To perform the decomposition, we conducted a logistic regression model in each economic group to determine the Odds Ratio (OR) as the main effect and its interaction with the other independent variables.Results : PWID with lower socioeconomic status (SES) had significantly higher odds of receptive syringe sharing (OR: 1.97; 95% Confidence Intervals=1.78-2.18, p_value < 0.001). The gap between the low and high SES groups for prevalence of receptive syringe sharing was 12.30%. The results of decomposition analyses indicate that access to needle and syringe programs and HIV knowledge factors together explained a major part of inequalities in injection risk behaviors in PWID.Conclusion : This study provides a considerable information on the high prevalence of injection risk behaviors in PWID with lower socioeconomic status. Also, this finding suggests striving to promote HIV knowledge in lower economic groups might be effective in buffering effects of economic inequality