Data tables of the Unlinked Anonymous Monitoring Survey of HIV and Hepatitis in people who inject drugs in the UK

By the National Infections Service, Public Health England

These tables present data from the Unlinked Anonymous Monitoring (UAM) Survey of People Who Inject Drugs (PWID) in contact with specialist services. This annual cross-sectional survey is co-ordinated by Public Health England, with support from Public Health Wales and Public Health Agency Northern Ireland. It is completed by people who inject psychoactive drugs. These data tables are updated annually and made available on the Public Health England GOV.UK website. Data from the biennial survey of people who inject image and performance enhancing drugs can be found in a separate set of tables published on the same webpage. The data within these tables are discussed in an accompanying report which is also available on the Public Health England GOV.UK website.

Data are presented separately for the whole of England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and sub-divided by country and PHE region. In some of these areas regional breakdowns could not be provided due to small numbers. Regional level data should be interpreted cautiously as figures may be from a small number of sites or a single site. For clarity, percentages are given to two significant figures. Confidence intervals are not presented but are available for the main findings within the accomapanying HPR.

This set of data tables presents data for the period 2008 to 2018. Data from the survey for earlier years (the survey has been running since 1990) can be found in past sets of data tables which are available via the Public Health England GOV.UK website.

This voluntary unlinked anonymous survey recruits people who inject drugs through specialist agencies within England, Wales and Northern Ireland. These agencies provide a range of services to those who inject drugs, from medical treatment to needle and syringe programmes and outreach work. People using these services that are either currently injecting drugs or who have done so previously are asked to take part in the survey by service staff. Those who agree to take part provide a biological specimen that is tested anonymously for HIV, hepatitis C and hepatitis B. Behavioural and limited demographic information is collected through a brief anonymous subject-completed questionnaire linked to the specimen but unlinked from any client identifying information. This includes questions on the uptake of diagnostic (voluntary confidential) testing for HIV and hepatitis C, hepatitis B vaccination and the sharing of injecting equipment; participants may opt out of answering any questions. The questions asked have varied over time.