BioMed Central, BMC Infectious Diseases, 1(15), 2015
DOI: 10.1186/s12879-015-1006-9
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Despite the widespread offer of free HIV testing in France, the proportion of people who have never been tested remains high. The objective of this study was to identify, in men and women separately, the various factors independently associated with no lifetime HIV testing. We used multilevel logistic regression models on data from the SIRS cohort, which included 3006 French-speaking adults as a representative sample of the adult population in the Paris metropolitan area in 2010. The lifetime absence of any HIV testing was studied in relation to individual demographic and socioeconomic factors, psychosocial characteristics, sexual biographies, HIV prevention behaviors, attitudes towards people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA), and certain neighborhood characteristics. In 2010, in the Paris area, men were less likely to have been tested for HIV at least once during their lifetime than women. In multivariate analysis, in both sexes, never having been tested was significantly associated with an age younger or older than the middle-age group (30-44 years), a low education level, a low self-perception of HIV risk, not knowing any PLWHA, a low lifetime number of couple relationships, and the absence of any history of STIs. In women, other associated factors were not having a child