CIET’s work on HIV and AIDS extends from Canada to Latin America and nine countries of Southern Africa and covers primary, secondary and tertiary AIDS prevention.

In South Africa:
 
CIET’s initial work, focused on Sexual Violence and HIV (see also Gender Violence),

School survey on sexual violence and HIV

which culminated in a nationwide school-based survey on sexual violence and HIV/AIDS whose results were published in the British Medical Journal.
 
Results from this study led to the production of a set of evidence-based audio series and workbooks being used in schools and adapted for out-of-school risk education.
 
Getting elders involved in HIV prevention was the focus of projects in Limpopo province.
 
In the realm of tertiary prevention a study of community response to antiretroviral therapy, initiated in South Africa’s Free State province was extended to Botswana.

Elsewhere in Southern Africa:
CIET conducted an eight-country project to measure the impact of mass media on HIV risk. The 2002 baseline was followed up in 2007.
The ADAPT programme (African Development of AIDS Prevention Trial) aims to build on local health capacity to plan, conduct, analyse and use the evidence from large scale, multi-centred AIDS prevention trials. It is a four-year CIET project funded by Canada’s Global Health Research Initiative. CIET runs ADAPT in partnership with the Department of Population Studies at the University of Botswana in Gaborone.
Linked to ADAPT is a computer-assisted decision tool that will model the likely impact of different prevention strategies on the spread of HIV and AIDS in the region.
A policy-oriented synthesis of evidence for AIDS prevention was completed in 2006. Also in 2006 an article entitled “Prevention for those who have freedom of choice – or among the choice-disabled: confronting equity in the AIDS epidemic” was published in AIDS Research and Therapy 2006, 3:23.
A systematic review of literature on the relationship between gender-based violence and HIV/AIDS was published in the journal AIDS.
A pragmatic randomized controlled trial in Botswana, Namibia and Swaziland on AIDS prevention through reduced choice-disability.

CIET has an office in Botswana, the seat of the ADAPT programme. It is there also that CIET has conducted training sessions for parliamentarians on evidence-based decision making.
 
In Swaziland, CIET helped to assess the effects of a Behavioural Change Campaign (BCC) aimed primarily at lowering HIV infections through the practice of engaging in sex with multiple partners
 
In Canada the focus has been on Aboriginal youth resilience to HIV and AIDS.
 
In Honduras an August 2002 baseline study generated evidence to help evaluate current programmes, design new ones, influence sexual behaviour and encourage youth leadership in preventing HIV.
 
CIETmexico studied the risks associated with accidental punctures from syringes in two hospitals of the city of Acapulco in 1989.
 
In Nicaragua in 2003, CIET evaluated HIV prevention activities of the Red Cross in the municipality of Jalapa.