Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Public Health and Surveillance
Date Submitted: Sep 5, 2018
Open Peer Review Period: Sep 6, 2018 - Sep 20, 2018
Date Accepted: May 9, 2019
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Estimating the population size of key populations in Kampala, Uganda using capture-recapture methods
ABSTRACT
Background:
Key populations, including people who inject drugs (PWID), men who have sex with men (MSM), and female sex workers (FSW) are disproportionately affected by the HIV epidemic. Understanding the magnitude of, and informing the public health response, to the HIV epidemic among these populations requires accurate size estimates. However, low social visibility poses challenges to these efforts.
Objective:
We derived population size estimates of PWID, MSM, and FSW in Kampala using capture-recapture methods.
Methods:
Between June and October 2017, unique objects were distributed to the PWID, MSM, and FSW populations in Kampala. PWID, MSM and FSW were each sampled during three independent captures; unique objects were offered in captures one and two. PWID, MSM and FSW sampled during captures two and three were asked if they had received either or both of the distributed objects. All captures were completed one week apart. The numbers of PWID, MSM, and FSW receiving one or both objects were determined. Population size estimates were derived using the Lincoln-Petersen method for two-source capture-recapture (PWID) and Bayesian nonparametric latent class model for three-source capture-recapture (MSM, FSW).
Results:
We sampled 467 PWID in capture one and 450 in capture two; a total of 54 PWID were captured in both. We sampled 542, 574, and 598 MSM in captures one, two, and three, respectively. There were 70 recaptures between captures one and two, 103 recaptures between captures two and three, and 155 recaptures between captures one and three. There were 57 MSM captured in all three captures. We sampled 962, 965, and 1417 FSW in captures one, two, and three, respectively. There were 316 recaptures between captures one and two, 214 recaptures between captures two and three, and 235 recaptures between captures one and three. There were 109 FSW captured in all three rounds. The estimated number of PWID was 3,892 (2,976-4,808) the estimated number of MSM was 14,019 (95% CI: 4,995-40,949), and the estimated number of FSW was 8,848 (95% CI: 6,337-17,470).
Conclusions:
Our population size estimates for PWID, MSM, and FSW in Kampala provide critical population denominator data to inform HIV prevention and treatment programs. Three-source capture- recapture is a feasible method to advance key population size estimation.
Citation
Per the author's request the PDF is not available.
Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.