ABSTRACT
Although bisexual behaviour appears to have played a role in HIV transmission in a number of different countries, it has been described as especially important in shaping the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Brazil, the country with the highest number of reported cases of AIDS in the Latin American region, and one of the most potentially explosive HIV/AIDS epidemics anywhere in the world (see Daniel and Parker, 1991, 1993; Parker and Tawil, 1991; Parker et al., 1994). While early epidemiological reports from throughout the country focused on HIV transmission principally in relation to men with exclusively homosexual behaviour, high numbers of AIDS cases were recorded as well among men reporting sexual relations not only with other men, but also with women. During the first decade of the AIDS epidemic in Brazil, for example, roughly 20 per cent of the reported cases of AIDS in Brazil were classified as bisexual males (Rodrigues and Chequer, 1989), and it has been suggested that at least some cases of AIDS classified as the result of heterosexual transmission might in fact be behaviourally bisexual men who, due to social stigma and discrimination associated with homosexual practices, might have failed to report their same-sex sexual contacts (Castilho et al., 1989).
