The largest survey of gay men ever held in Europe (apart from the Eurovision Song Contest) is now taking place. Those who take part are also making a political statement.
There has never been anything like it: since Friday evening at 6pm, gay men in 31 European countries have been able to provide an international team of researchers with information online about their lifestyle and their knowledge of gay health issues. The questionnaire asks about sexuality, relationships and dealing with HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. The questionnaire is available in 25 languages.
The results of the gigantic survey called EMIS ("European MSM Internet Survey") are intended to show how men who have sex with men (MSM) deal with health risks during sex in the respective countries. This will allow information on protection and dealing with risks to be optimally tailored to the target groups in future.
"Size matters!" - is the slogan used to advertise the project in Germany. The more men take part in the survey, the more meaningful the results will be.
Above all, however, high numbers of participants can send an important political signal. In many homophobic countries - for example in Eastern Europe - gay people have particularly poor opportunities to take care of their health. Stigmatisation of homosexuality makes access to information about risks, HIV testing and HIV treatment more difficult. Discrimination often also reduces the motivation to protect oneself.
"With mass participation in the survey, gays can now make a Europe-wide claim to have their health needs taken seriously by politicians," says Dr Dirk Sander, Gay Affairs Officer at Deutsche AIDS-Hilfe. "We are therefore counting on as much support as possible from the community!"
Deutsche AIDS-Hilfe is one of the many organisations involved in the research project. In Germany, the Federal Centre for Health Education (BZgA), the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) and the Berlin Social Science Centre (WZB) are also involved.
EMIS continues the well-known safer sex surveys by sociologist Michael Bochow, who is of course also involved.
The questionnaires are online until 31 August. Let's go!
(Holger Wicht)
