Long-lasting, injectable HIV prevention drug set for “aggressive” roll-out in Africa

Tools to fight HIV tend to come late to sub-Saharan Africa, the region hardest hit by the epidemic. After powerful, lifesaving cocktails of HIV drugs came to market in 1996, it took 7 years before they began to reach large numbers of people living with the virus there. When pills to prevent, rather than treat, HIV infection were introduced in 2012—a strategy known as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP)—Africa was again slow to benefit. But with the next revolution in HIV prevention—an injectable, long-lasting version of PrEP—Africans may actually soon lead the pack. Not many people in rich countries have started to take this formulation, mainly because of insurance hassles for the expensive drug. But injectable PrEP is now on the cusp of being widely introduced in Africa, thanks to the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), a U.S. government program, which has purchased it at a steep discount. “Over the next 2 years, we will see more injectable PrEP use in East and Southern Africa than we’ll see in the U.S.,” predicts Mitchell Warren, who heads AVAC, an advocacy group for HIV prevention. “That’s turning history on its head.” PEPFAR had provided 24,000 doses of injectable PrEP in Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Malawi by 6 March and has plans for an “aggressive scale-up,” says PEPFAR head John Nkengasong. The drug has “the potential to bend the curve on the annual 1.3 million new HIV infections globally,” Nkengasong says, but the...
Source: Science of Aging Knowledge Environment - Category: Geriatrics Source Type: research