U. professor receives grant for HIV prevention research on Latino men

Edward Alessi, a professor and graduate program director in the School of Social Work and core faculty in the University's Global Health Institute, recently received a grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities to investigate social determinants' impact on HIV programming among migrant Latino sexual minority men (SMM).

Alessi co-authored the grant proposal with Gabriel Robles, an assistant professor in the Dworak-Peck School of Social Work at the University of Southern California, for an exploratory study to survey how structural social and environmental conditions affect sexual risk and adoption of HIV prevention methods in Latino SSM migrants who have resided in the U.S. for five years or less.

Robles said that existing research corroborates that Latino SMM have higher rates of HIV risk due to their lower use of biomedical prevention services.

According to the Center for Migration Studies, there are an estimated 11.7 million undocumented people in the U.S. as of July 2023. 

"We have to assume, out of those 11.7 million, that some of them are LGBTQ, that they're queer … We have to specifically understand the needs of gay and bisexual men identifying as Latino," Alessi said.

He said that this subset of the population needs to be urgently studied due to their higher risk of HIV and the changing demographics of cities such as New Brunswick before the health disparities become too severe.

The professors are forming a migrant Latino SSM community advisory board where members suggest improvements to the current study design and track its progress, according to Alessi. Robles added that after the board develops, the study will begin collecting data.

According to the project summary, the study comprises two phases. The first part is a grassroots social media campaign and a national online survey of 300 migrant Latino SSM using LGBTQ+ dating apps. Robles explained that the study aims to target all networks of LGBTQ+ communities throughout the U.S.

The second phase uses interviews with a subset of these men about their use of PrEP, a medication that lowers the risk of HIV, to collect holistic data about their experiences and report the best intervention practices to reduce health disparities in this group, Alessi said.

He described how the intersection of sexuality and immigration status raises unique challenges for this population. Seeking housing and employment opportunities is arduous because the stigma of being LGBTQ+ isolates them from their families and communities, Alessi said.

Also, it is harder for Latino SMM to find healthcare resources and support the further away they reside from metropolitan cities such as New York and San Francisco, Robles added.

Their immigration status forces them to take dangerous jobs with poor working conditions and often meager benefits or no insurance, further cornering them to use low-cost health care services or depriving them of care altogether, Robles said.

He also said migrant men need both legal and health care assistance. According to Robles, the solutions must go beyond doctor-patient interactions and involve more evidence-based public health interventions.

The future directions of this study include using multiple comparison groups, collaborating with health care providers to discuss their experience with treating Latino SMM and encompassing broader primary care services, Alessi said.

"I think (Robles) and I have taken a pressing public health issue and showed why it's important," Alessi said. "We're dealing with three important issues … sexual minority, migration (and) Latino identity."