Effects of Education and Other Socioeconomic Variables on Human Immunodeficiency Virus Seroprevalence in India, Russia, South Africa and the United States of America

Objective According to the World Bank, increasing global funding to eradicate HIV in developing countries has not been successful as newly-diagnosed HIV cases continue to emerge. Given the widespread presence of this disease in the world, this research aims to establish the link between education and macro-level socioeconomic variables with the HIV epidemic in India, Russia, South Africa and the United States of America (USA).;Methods Socioeconomic variables were extracted from the World Development Indicators dataset of the World Bank Data Repository. The HIV variables were identified from the surveillance reports of individual countries. A time series analysis was performed for the study countries and a multivariate regression analysis was conducted for which a significance level was established at a p-value ≤ 0.10. A panel analysis was performed to examine the impact of independent variables on the HIV epidemic in the developing countries by reducing heterogeneity.;Results These results provide a comparison between the study countries to determine if there is a common factor that countries could put resources into to combat the HIV epidemic. The regression analysis demonstrated that in India, HIV incidence had an inverse relationship with secondary school enrollment for females (p < 0.0001). Furthermore, in Russia HIV prevalence increased with improved access to water sources in rural areas (p = 0.0082). Likewise, HIV prevalence in South Africa was positively related to the change in improved access to sanitation facilities in the urban areas (p = 0.001). These results are consistent with the literature however an unusual relationship was observed between enrollment and HIV incidence in the USA and Russia. Results of the panel analysis demonstrated a significant effect of school enrollment on HIV incidence in the three developing countries. This study looked at various socioeconomic aspects of the four countries to give a plausible explanation for the results which were not consistent with the literature.;Conclusion This research provides an important indication of which macro-level factors can be addressed to curb HIV in the developing world. Additionally, this research can potentially provide an important indication of how best to employ limited resources.