ASSESSING HIVAIDS KNOWLEDGE, SEXUAL RISK BEHAVIOURS AND ATTITUDES TOWARDS HIV TESTING OF UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS AT UDS CAMPUS, NYANKPALA

This study demonstrated that majority of the enrolled students at the UDS Nyankpala campus had inadequate HIV knowledge regarding its various modes of transmission with an average knowledge score of 10.36  3.0 (mean  SD). Christians (11.09  3.31), students 25 years and over (10.77  3.31) and level 300 students (11.53  3.46) had significantly higher knowledge of HIV in their respective sub groups. However, none of the socio-demographic factors had any effect on the HIV knowledge levels of students. In addition to this, the sexual risk behaviours of students, their attitudes toward HIV testing and attitudes toward people living with HIV had no association with their level of HIV knowledge. The evaluation of each student’s HIV knowledge scores suggests the need for more comprehensive HIV/AIDS education in tertiary institutions; most especially, increased education on effective condom use and HIV testing as majority of the sexually active students failed to use a condom during their last sexual activity and had never been tested for HIV (79.1%). However, most of the students showed positive attitudes towards testing for HIV as 67.9% showed interest in testing for HIV. The students showed moderate attitudes towards people living with HIV as 33.4% indicated that they would keep the same level of contact if they found out that someone they knew was infected, while 32.5% stated that they were not sure how they would react and communicate in a similar situation. Furthermore, 54.3% of the students assessed their risk of HIV to be very low while 2% assessed their risk of HIV as very high. The report recommends that sexual and reproductive health education be implemented by the Ministry of Education in primary and secondary schools. In addition, specialized and supplemental seminars on this topic should also be set up in universities and high schools to help raise HIV awareness.