Dr. Stephanie Strathdee

Earlier this year, UCSD researcher Stephanie Strathdee released a study chronicling various characteristics of female sex workers in Tijuana and other border cities.

The results were shocking.Twenty-seven percent of the women Strathdee studied tested positive for at least one sexually transmitted infection; 14 percent almost always use drugs before sex; 73 percent have clients who use drugs.When examining sex workers with U.S. clients, she found the median price per sex act with a condom was ,20.The price for a sex act without a condom: ,30.

Strathdee and her colleagues' study was interventionist in nature.The researchers aimed to encourage safe-sex practices, such as wearing condoms and receiving regular tests for STIs.But Strathdee says that more intervention is needed, and it's needed now.

"What we're seeing in Tijuana is the edge of an emerging HIV epidemic," Strathdee says."And, if we don't do something about it -- not just as individuals, but as a society, as a border community on both sides -- then we're going to be paying the price."

Strathdee sat down with voiceofsandiego.org to talk about her research.

"There's more detection going on, but we're finding there's a lot of undiagnosed cases," said Dr. Stephanie Strathdee, of the Division of International Health and Cross Cultural Medicine at the University of California San Diego, who worked with Magis and other researchers on the study of AIDS prevalence in Tijuana.

And according to researcher Stephanie Strathdee at UCSD, the number of men and women between the ages of 15 to 49 who are infected with HIV in Tijuana may be as high as one in 125.

Dr. Stephanie StrathdeeUniversity of California, San Diego