On 1st December, the Survey of HIV-related Knowledge, Attitude & Behavior among Men Who Have Sex With Men(MSMKABS), with its Chinese code as “Rainbow Health Action”, hosted by GTZT.ORG is now in operation. The investigation will last for four months, covering most places in China, and will be functioning simultaneously by been linked to other MSM websites.

A combination of survey and intervention
The investigation system is crafty designed by changing plodding investigation into a conjoint service system of investigation and instant respond. Various information technologies have been employed to enhance the experience of participants. A risk evaluation system is embedded which responds to a participant’s inputs and generates a risk evaluation report with detailed risk control recommendations accordingly.

Why this online one?
Most MSMs are living a silent and secret life because of the social discrimination in China. Therefore investigation into this subpopulation has become a tough job. Before this one, there have been many organizations and investigators in China taking investigations in this field and have got the basic information of the homosexual individuals, including the usage of condoms, the rate of STD/HIV infection, among others. But these investigations are restricted by many factors.
With the development of Internet, more and more MSMs call for help, express their emotion, and seeking partners through Internet. According to an incomplete survey, there are about 320 MSM-oriented websites in China, and the users are around 4,000,000. Many of these websites have already adapted to carrying out some health education, and have been affiliated with many localities to the prevention of STD and HIV. All these efforts have been so important that this online investigation and intervention is now possible. Compared to field investigation which requires enormous resources, however, online investigation is much more economic, and helps to meet the need for anonymity.

Development of the system
The preparation phase of MSMKABS began on March, 2006. Mr. Xing Jianmin, PHD of Peking Union Medical College Tsinghua University designed the questionnaire,  based on an investigational questionnaire developed by China CDC and the Behavioral Surveillance and Survey (BSS) of Family Healthy International (FHI). GZTZ.ORG has developed the infrastructure and helps embellishment according to MSM features and optimization of the questionnaire. Three pilot surveys and dozens of face-to-face interviews have been conducted to collect the opinions from MSMs before the final edition is put into effect.

How will the data be used?
This investigation will be taken by a participant voluntarily and anonymously. Strict technical security measures, including automatic data management and encryption of sensitive data, have been adopted to protect the participants’ privacy. The result of investigation is mainly used for academic study, while the analysis result will be released in a form that is generally accepted by the MSM community.