Tipping Point in the AIDS Epidemic

published on April 11, 2014 in Medscape

CAPE TOWN, South Africa — The number of new HIV infections continues to decline steadily in response to a greater uptake of antiretroviral therapy (ART) by people who are infected with HIV or at risk for infection.

In fact, the tipping point in the AIDS epidemic has been reached, according to Salim Abdool Karim, MD, PhD, director of the Centre for the AIDS Program of Research in South Africa (CAPRISA).

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Treatment as Prevention

The treatment as prevention strategy works, said Julio Montaner, MD, DSc, architect of the strategy and director of the British Columbia Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS in Vancouver, Canada.

After ART was rolled out in British Columbia, the data unexpectedly showed that as a steady state was reached in terms of the number of patients receiving highly active ART, the number of new infections dropped, he told Medscape Medical News.

"All this was happening against a background of rapidly increased syphilis rates in the community, so we reasoned that ART was the only way to explain this significant change," he reported.

Subsequent cost-effective modeling showed that initiating treatment at diagnosis would save money because there would be dramatic benefits for people infected with and those at risk for HIV.

Pam Harrison
Medscape
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Julio Montaner

BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS

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Tipping Point in the AIDS Epidemic

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