Less Jail Time Could Slow Spread of HIV: Study

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A new study suggests that reducing the number of incarceration would slow down the spread of HIV.

Individuals who get to jail are contained in prisons but they remain sexually active, despite being away from their spouse or partners. In fact, when in jail, they are at higher chances of increasing their number of sexual partners.

Following this consequences, a new study published in the journal of Social Science and Medicine suggest that reducing the number of men who go to prison could help curb HIV and other sexually transmitted disease, Infection Control Today reported.

According to UPI, a computer model developed at the University of Michigan revealed the negative trend of more men going to prison. Furthermore, the researchers learned that the longer the sentences the worse the effects.

The team focused on men because they are incarcerated more often than women. In 2009, 954 out of every 100,000 men in the United State went to jail, compared to 68 out of every 100,000 women.

"The model shows that simply removing men and returning them to the community frequently can increase the number of sexual partners that both men and women have in the community," said Dr. Andrea Knittel, a researcher at the University of California San Francisco in a press release.

"It supports the assertion that mass incarceration has complicated and far-reaching unintended consequences, and may have significant public health implications."

The team developed an agent-based model -- a computer simulation that creates a small community with 250 agents or simulated people who date and have sexual partners. Then, they ran a simulation without incarceration to check how many sexual partners men and women would have. They also run the same simulation with incarceration to see if there are differences.

The team uses the data from other studies suggesting that, when men are in jail, they have a slightly higher risk of ending the relationship and become slightly less desirable as partners.

They found out that incarceration increased the number of sexual partners for both men and women. They also discovered that, the harsher or the longer the sentences are, the worse its effects.

"The methods are interesting and unique, and offer a digital petri dish in which experiments that would be impossible in the real world are absolutely doable. The results from computational models can never be applied thoughtlessly to the real world, but are thought-provoking and demonstrate what is possible," Knittel said about the procedure.

The researchers concluded that high levels of imprisonment have a role in community-level sexual behavior and it increases sexual risk for HIV and STDs.

"The results suggest that reducing incarceration and creating a more open criminal justice system that supports the maintenance of inmates' relationships to reduce instability of partnerships for men who are incarcerated may have important sexual health and public health implications."