Grant: Planning Grants - Priority Announcement: Infection and Immunity

Since the start of the HIV epidemic, men who have sex with men (MSM) have carried the highest burden of infection in Western countries, including Canada. Despite major developments in HIV therapies and ongoing, widespread prevention work, this remains true today. Of all current HIV infections in Canada, 48% are found among MSM, a number significantly higher than any other risk group. In addition, of new HIV infections occurring in Canada, 44% occur among MSM; again, a significantly higher number than other groups. HIV rates in MSM are unacceptably high in Canadian cities, with up to one quarter of MSM infected. Finally, certain racial and ethnic groups, including Black, Aboriginal, and immigrant and foreign-born populations, may have heightened vulnerability to HIV due to a number of different factors. Our group (the MSM Working Group) is newly-formed within the CIHR Canadian HIV Trials Network, a national partnership that brings together stakeholders in HIV research and service provision, whose goal is to support and facilitate high-quality HIV research. Recognizing that there is a significant lack of understanding of the diversity and needs of MSM across Canada, and that MSM continue to be affected and infected by HIV at alarming rates, the MSM Working Group aims: to bring together a collaboration of expert researchers and community members in the field of HIV prevention to identify key research needs; to identify successful local or provincial projects examining HIV prevention in MSM, as well as relevant factors making up completed, important research; to ascertain research priorities in the domain of HIV prevention in MSM; and to formulate a large-scale, nationwide study examining HIV prevention in MSM and formalize a plan to apply for new funding to conduct a large national study. This planning meeting will tentatively take place in Toronto in Spring 2013, with the aim of submitting a grant for a CIHR Operating Grant within 6-12 months of the meeting.