Background: Black older-teenaged women have disproportionately high rates of sexually transmitted infections (STI) and unintended pregnancy (UTP). Internet-based interventions can be delivered to large groups of people in a relatively inexpensive manner. In this randomized trial, we examine the efficacy of an evidence-based STI/UTP prevention intervention adapted for older teens and for Internet delivery.Methods: Black women aged 18-19 years who were not pregnant/ seeking to become pregnant were enrolled (n = 637) and randomized to an 8-session intervention or attention control and were followed up at 6/ 12 months postintervention. The primary outcome was defined as uptake of reliable contraceptives. Other secondary outcomes were examined, including intention to use condoms, intention to use reliable contraception, and STI or pregnancy rates.

Service learning is a pedagogical strategy in which students complete a project at a community-based organization where they can apply classroom skills in a real-world context. Service learning can benefit student learning outcomes and continues to expand in public health education; yet there is the potential for ethical concerns. In particular, service learning may reinforce inequities between academic institutions and community organizations by positioning academic institutions as holding significant power and resources and inadvertently promoting this dynamic to students. This perspective provides an overview of service learning in public health and related fields, discusses the benefits of service learning as well as the gaps in standardization and evaluation, and highlights situations in which inequities may emerge. Recommendations are provided, with the goal of helping future health promotion professionals better meet the objective of fostering social justice through public health.

HIV vaccine mediated efficacy, using an expanded live attenuated recombinant varicella virus-vectored SIV rSVV-SIVgag/env vaccine prime with adjuvanted SIV-Env and SIV-Gag protein boosts, was evaluated in a female rhesus macaques (RM) model against repeated intravaginal SIV challenges. Vaccination induced anti-SIV IgG responses and neutralizing antibodies were found in all vaccinated RMs. Three of the eight vaccinated RM remained uninfected (vaccinated and protected, VP) after 13 repeated challenges with the pathogenic SIVmac251-CX-1. The remaining five vaccinated and infected (VI) macaques had significantly reduced plasma viral loads compared with the infected controls (IC). A significant increase in systemic central memory CD4+ T cells and mucosal CD8+ effector memory T-cell responses was detected in vaccinated RMs compared to controls. Variability in lymph node SIV-Gag and Env specific CD4+ and CD8+ T cell cytokine responses were detected in the VI RMs while all three VP RMs had more durable cytokine responses following vaccination and prior to challenge. VI RMs demonstrated predominately SIV-specific monofunctional cytokine responses while the VP RMs generated polyfunctional cytokine responses. This study demonstrates that varicella virus-vectored SIV vaccination with protein boosts induces a 37.5% efficacy rate against pathogenic SIV challenge by generating mucosal memory, virus specific neutralizing antibodies, binding antibodies, and polyfunctional T-cell responses.

Purpose: Incentivized peer referral (IPR) has been shown to be an effective method of recruitment for men who have sex with men but has not been studied extensively in men who have sex with women (MSW), particularly among Black MSW. We aimed to determine if IPR was more effective than uncompensated peer referral for recruiting young Black men into a community STI screening study. Methods: We used data from the Check It study, a chlamydia (Ct) screening and treatment program for young Black men ages 15-26 in New Orleans, LA. Enrollment was compared before and after IPR was implemented using Multiple Series Analysis (MTSA). IPR was introduced to increase recruitment that had been severely diminished because of the COVID-19 shutdown. Results: Of 1527 men enrolled, 1399 (91.6%) were enrolled pre-IPR and 128 (8.4%) were enrolled post-IPR. The percentage of men referred by a friend or peer was higher in the post-IPR period than in the pre-IPR period (45.7% vs. 19.7%, p<0.001). Post-pandemic, we observed a statistically significant increase of 2.007 more recruitments (p=0.044, 95% CI (0.0515, 3.964)) at the start of the post-IPR era, compared to the pre-IPR era. Overall, we also observed a trending increase in recruitments in the IPR era relative to the pre-IPR era (0.0174 recruitments/week, p=0.285, 95% CI (-0.0146, 0.0493)) with less recruitment decay in the post-IPR compared to pre-IPR. Conclusions: IPR may be an effective means of engaging young Black men in community based STI research and prevention programs, particularly when clinic access is limited.

No abstract