How ethical are HIV prevention trials? Every time we announce results of a trial that compares new HIV infections in a group with or without some new intervention (a microbicide for example, or a vaccine), some journalist or other jumps on the fact that researchers are just watching people get infected. Researchers then explain that [...]
Halleluliah! We’ve finally got something to be happy about in HIV prevention — a microbicide that cuts the risk of HIV infection by a third. You’d think everyone would be shouting for joy. But no, we’re bending over backwards to say we’re not sure it works.
The product in question is Pro2000 gel, and the results [...]
When I’m asked: What’s the next big thing in HIV prevention? I usually put Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis somewhere high on the list. We don’t yet know if giving out expensive drugs so that people can have unprotected sex without worrying about HIV will work. But I usually ask people to imagine the headlines in The Daily [...]
I’ve been taken to task for not weighing in on the kerfuffle about whether people on ARVs can pass on HIV. In case you haven’t been following the debate, the Swiss AIDS Commission has reviewed studies of couples where one partner has HIV and the other doesn’t, and has looked at HIV transmission with and [...]
Buried in the controversial Swiss report on HIV treatment and transmission of the virus is a nugget about initiating treatment. (French report here, unofficial English translation here) They say that antiretrovirals should only be given when it is medically indicated, and not to prevent the onward transmission of HIV in discordant couples. Two reasons: in [...]
So if you give antiretrovirals to humanised mice (don’t ask) and then slosh their vaginas full of HIV, they don’t get infected, according to a new study from Paul Denton and colleagues at the University of Texas. None of the five mice treated with a combination of emtricitabine and tenofovir got infected, whereas 7 out [...]
