Ijang PF and Sundjo F
Having access to quality health and comprehensive HIV/AIDS prevention services is a human right for everyone irrespective of age, sex, gender and sexual orientation. Making HIV prevention services accessible to key populations with minimal social, legal and behavioral barriers will go a long way to curb the incidence among these groups, improve health outcomes as well as reduce HIV prevalence in the general population. Despite the importance of increasing access to preventive services most studies have focused on access to treatment at the detriment of access to prevention. The main objective of this research was to investigate the determinants of access to HIV prevention services for female sex workers and men having sex with men in the Bamenda Health district. Specifically, the study aimed at investigating the drivers of non-accessibility to HIV prevention services for Men having sex with Men and Female sex workers and secondly, to scrutinize the drivers of non-accessibility to HIV prevention services for Men having sex with Men and Female sex workers in the Bamenda Health district. In order to obtain data for the study, 373 and 199 questionnaires were administered to assess prevention service access to FSW and MSM respectively. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics, Chi-square, and the Bivariate and Multivariate regressions. The descriptive statistics showed that only 29.2% and 55.8% of FSW and MSM who participated in the study have access to comprehensive HIV prevention services respectively. Significant barriers such as, long geographic distance, non-awareness of where to get services, un-favorable policy and law as well as inconsistency in condom use were all factors limiting access to prevention services. Demographic factors like occupation and monthly income also proved to be significant in access to prevention services for FSW. Thus for access to be effective, actors should take these key issues into consideration.