Social networks and the spread of AIDS in Brazil

A epidemia de HIV/AIDS tem sido compreendida de maneira simplista como um fen??meno restrito a grupos de risco delimitados social e espacialmente. Nos ??ltimos anos a evolu????o da epidemia demonstrou, no entanto, a necessidade de modelos de difus??o abertos, enfatizando a intera????o social como meio de propaga????o do HIV. Neste trabalho analisa-se a epidemia da AIDS no Brasil do ponto de vista espacial, buscando a incorpora????o de vari??veisque reflitam a din??mica de eventos econ??micos e demogr??ficos ao geoprocessamento de informa????es de sa??de. Verifica-se que as metr??poles e centros regionais, principalmente da regi??o Sudeste, possuem importante papel na difus??o da epidemia, n??o s?? por sua densidade populacional, mas por concentrar atividades de troca e intera????o social. Outras cidades de menor porte, situadas no estado de S??o Paulo, concentram grande n??mero de casos de AIDS entre usu??rios de drogas injet??veis, evidenciando rotas e centros de consumo de coca??na.The HIV/AIDS epidemic has been simplistically interpreted as a phenomenon restricted to risk groups that are socially and spatially circumscribed. However, epidemic trends in recent years have demonstrated the need to employ open diffusion models that emphasize social interaction as a means of spread of HIV. This study is a spatial analysis of the AIDS epidemic in Brazil, which sought to incorporate variables reflecting economic and demographic events into a system for processing geographically referenced health information. Findings indicate that metropolises and regional urban centers, mainly those in the Southeast, play an important role in the spread of the epidemic, not only because of their population density but also because they are centers of trade and social interaction. In smaller cities located in the state of Sao Paulo, a large number of AIDS cases among injecting drug users are concentrated, revealing the routes and centers of cocaine use