SPOTS 2025 IS NOW CLOSED!
Three months has flown by! This study period, the team has been working across the motu to get the survey to as many people as possible. We’ve been to all sorts of events, everything from Pride Fairs and Picnics, to Rainbow Dog Shows.
The insights you’ve shared will help guide sexual health services and community organisations, such as Burnett Foundation Aotearoa and Body Positive, in improving HIV and sexual health care for our communities.
Information from the previous survey has already been used extensively to benefit our communities. Examples include updating blood donation processes, PrEP delivery, testing innovations, and experiences with healthcare like your GP.
You can see more results from the previous round of SPOTS here - and if you’d like to keep up with SPOTS news and developments, sign up using the email link below!
What ever happened with the blood donation policy from last time?
Medsafe has approved the Blood Service's application to move towards individually assessing each donor, rather than a blanket policy making men who had sex with men in the last three months ineligible to donate due to the risk of HIV.
"SPOTS data shows that four out of five gay and bisexual men in NZ wanted to donate blood if the rules were changed and they were allowed to donate," says SPOTS Principal Investigator Dr Peter Saxton.
"Importantly, our data suggest this would be safe for blood recipients. We found no participants with confirmed undiagnosed HIV. Therefore, we are delighted that SPOTS participants are helping improve NZ's blood donor policy."
What’s SPOTS all about?
SPOTS 2025 has closed - sign up for email updates above to get involved in future rounds!
What are we researching?
This study is about sex between men and HIV in Aotearoa New Zealand, led by the University of Auckland in partnership with Burnett Foundation Aotearoa. The last time we conducted a study like this was in 2022. Now, we aim to see what has changed. A key focus of the 2025 survey is to improve our understanding of how men who have sex with men (MSM) reduce their HIV risks and manage their sexual health. This includes understanding the use of existing tools like condoms, pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), testing and achieving an undetectable HIV viral load (U=U). We are also interested in learning how MSM are engaging with newer prevention tools, such as doxycycline post-exposure prophylaxis (DoxyPEP), post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP), and Mpox vaccinations.
Who can take part?
Men who have sex with men (MSM), including cis and trans men, who are aged 16 or older and live in Aotearoa NZ. You can also take part if you are a trans women or non-binary person and have sex with MSM, or if you identify as a gay, bisexual, queer or pansexual man but have never had sex with a man.
Participants can be of any HIV status, ethnicity, region, relationship status, out/not out, new to the scene or long-time members of the community. We want to hear from everyone so your voices can inform future decisions about our community's health and inclusion!
How can people take part?
We are inviting eligible people to complete a voluntary, anonymous electronic survey asking participants about their sexual activity and risk reduction approaches. It should take between 8-20 minutes.