From scene to screen: the challenges and opportunities of commercial digital platforms for HIV community outreach

Abstract

E-Health initiatives typically rely on the development of bespoke digital platforms and one resulting drawback is that those who are deemed most ‘at risk’ (of type II diabetes, obesity, STIs, mental health issues) struggle to engage with such interventions. Potential users either do not know about, or want to (to be seen to) engage with it. Such ‘failure’ to engage has long been recognised by HIV community outreach programmes. Aware of the stigma associated with visiting an STI clinic, outreach programmes have relied on peer educators visiting the spaces that men use to source sex. These sites are both commercial (saunas, bars, clubs) and non- commercial (parks, laybys, public bathrooms).
This article reports on the development of a digital initiative pioneered by the UK’s Terrence Higgins Trust. NetReach harnesses the charity’s expertise in community outreach to develop short-term interventions on digital services used by men in their daily lives. The majority of these services are commercial and include ‘social media’ apps and conventional websites.

Chiefly, this article explores the opportunities and challenges HIV awareness peer educators face when trying to establish intervention services on commercial social media platforms and within subcultures that adopt an ambivalent attitude towards discourses of sexual health promotion. The discussion highlights the potential that commercial platforms offer to peer educators in terms of reaching local cohorts of men, together with the constraints placed upon this form of outreach as a result of the commercial imperatives that underpin these digital services.

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