The Botswana AIDS Impact Survey III (BAIS III) is the third sexual behavioural survey and was conducted under the auspices of the Central Statistics Office’s Programme of Household Surveys. The BAIS III fieldwork took place between 15th July and 22nd October 2008. The study was designed to provide information on topics explicitly related to HIV/AIDS. In this household survey, a randomly selected sample group of women and men aged 10 – 64 years were interviewed for sexual behavioral data collection while those households within the sample having household members aged 18 months and over were covered with consent to participate in the HIV testing survey.

The information was de-linked and made anonymous as the specimen was uniquely bar-coded and submitted to the laboratory for testing. The BAIS III consultative processes started in 2007 where several meetings were held to discuss instruments development issues and other preparatory activities. In March 2008 the survey instruments were pretested in Gaborone and surrounding areas principally to test their relevance and applicability. The BAIS III has three major components, namely the Household Questionnaire, the Individual Questionnaire and the Blood Collection Form.

The Household Questionnaire was used to list all members of the selected households and their demographic characteristics such as age, sex, orphanhood (0-17 years) and economic activity. The Individual Questionnaire was designed to capture information regarding demographic characteristics, care and support, marriage and cohabiting partnerships, alcohol consumption and drug use, sexual history and behavior, male circumcision and sexually transmitted diseases, knowledge about HIV/AIDS and level of interventions, attitudes towards people with HIV/AIDS, childbearing and antenatal care as well as availability of social and medical services in response to the pandemic. The third component is on the scale of the pandemic. It was designed to collect blood samples from members of households aged 18 months and over for testing and estimation of HIV prevalence and derivation of incidence measures.