Treatment as Prevention¨

It’s a Thursday morning in March, and the red Toyota Sienna is ready to start on its route from the North End Community Health Centre on Gottingen Street through the streets of Halifax. To most, the van goes unnoticed. Besides the slightly raised ceiling, the only distinguishing feature on the van is a vanity plate

The end of the era of AIDS can be a matter of time after a large-scale study of 1,000 males whose HIV infection was completely suppressed with antiretroviral drugs, didn’t infect their partners. “The success of the therapy means that if all HIV-positive people received treatment, further spread of the infection would not happen,” writes

Undetectable equals Untransmittable/U=U vs. Treatment as Prevention (TasP). One has captured the imagination of people living with HIV (PLWH) around the world while the other seems to have disappeared. U=U was created by community to empower PLWH to have an undetectable viral load so they can’t transmit HIV. TasP was created by scientists to explain

LEXINGTON, Ky. (May 16, 2019) – Jennifer Havens, Ph.D., professor of behavioral science in the University of Kentucky College of Medicine, faculty member in the Center on Drug and Alcohol Research and member of the team awarded $87 million through the National Institutes of Health’s HEALing Communities study, has spent the past decade studying the

A high number of HIV cases among the LGBTQ community’s African-American and Hispanic populations has become one of the top health crises in the Houston area and the southern United States. Specifically, the sub-groups at greater risk of acquiring HIV are African-American and Hispanic men who have sex with men (MSM) and transgender people of

Researchers apply network theory to HIV protein structure, uncovering a vital link between connectivity and protective immune response. In 2017, nearly 37 million people were living with HIV worldwide, according to the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS). Current treatments for the virus, which becomes AIDS in its most advanced stage, involve a combination

中國疾病控制與預防中心，早前與卑詩省愛滋病/愛滋病毒卓越研究中心(BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS)簽署愛滋病治療及預防合作協議，中國疾控中心流行病學首席專家吳尊友，日前到訪卑詩，昨日接受本報記者專訪時表示，兩國醫療合作不會受到加中關係及個別事件的影響。他更表示，今次出訪加國所辦理的手續都甚為順利，沒有出現問題。 健康服務不應有國界限制 吳尊友周三向本報記者稱，中國疾控中心自2010年即與卓越研究中心展開交流，去年更再次簽署為期3年的協議，繼續在愛滋病治療及預防方面展開合作，包括派研究人員前來卑詩省學習及研究。此次他到訪卑詩，也是履行協議中的一些研究任務。 他指出，中國感染愛滋病毒的人數仍在增加，疾控中心曾嘗試在夫妻只有一方感染愛滋病毒的「單陽家庭」派發安全套，以防止病毒傳播，但這一方法僅在中原地區有效，在一些偏遠邊疆地區卻收效甚微。而卑詩愛滋病卓越中心首創的「預防愛滋病毒治療」(TasP)方法，卻成功地解決了這個問題。以往愛滋病患者是否服藥要根據其免疫功能狀況，而預防治療法則毋須參考這一標準，直接使用藥物防止患者通過體液傳播病毒，有效控制愛滋病的傳播。 2011年，中國成為第一個宣布採用卓越中心開創的預防愛滋病毒治療方法的國家，並將該治療納入國家愛滋病防治政策，大規模增加了愛滋病病毒的檢測。 僅在2017年，中國就進行了2億次愛滋病病毒檢測。 吳尊友說，以往在中國邊疆地區，1,000個單陽家庭中有30個患者會將病毒傳染給另一半，而使用預防治療法後，2017年這一數字下降至7個。 卑詩省愛滋病卓越中心主任蒙塔納(Julio Montaner)表示，預防愛滋病毒治療方法可以有效控制愛滋病毒在高危人群中的傳播，而通過與中方的合作，他看到這一方法在中國可以切實得到實施，且取得非常好的成效。 對於加中關係緊張，令兩國在不少領域的合作都受到影響，蒙塔納表示，公共醫療領域不應有國界限制，因為病毒傳播起來也是沒有疆域限制的。 吳尊友亦不認為加中關係會對醫療及科技領域的合作造成影響，他稱健康服務沒有政治色彩，他此次辦理赴加手續亦非常順利，獲得加拿大駐華使館簽發的5年多次往返簽證，非常有利他與卓越研究中心的合作與交流。 圖文：本報記者王學文