11 March 2016 VOLUME 17 ISSUE 10

History will judge us harshly if we don't do enough to deliver it to individuals and groups at highest risk of HIV infection. We should see the International AIDS Conference in Durban this July as an opportunity to expand PrEP's reach by overcoming fear and foreboding and paving the way for a long-awaited and necessary HIV prevention option.

One pill a day will soon help keep thousands of sex workers HIV-free after the Department of Health is expected to announce on Friday (March 11) that it will provide antiretrovirals to thousands HIV-negative sex workers in a bid to keep them HIV free.

A team led by the Duke Human Vaccine Institute and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) has tracked the evolution of HIV and the body's corresponding immune response, hoping now to turn the knowledge gained into an experimental vaccine.

Last year the Medicines Control Council approved a daily antiretroviral pill for HIV-negative people to reduce their risk of contracting HIV...., pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP.....The Department of Health is still drafting guidelines on its use....Some questions arise....Will it be effective enough for women in South Africa? Who should take it? What will it cost? And should it be an HIV prevention priority?

A new nanotech approach has been used to stabilize membrane proteins, an advance investigators at the Karolinska Institute say should open up a new frontier for drug developers....The key to a successful experiment on HIV revolved around the cellular protein saposin, known to bind to lipids in order to transport them to various places in the cell. They then constructed saposin-based lipid nanoparticles that would stabilize the membrane proteins, holding them in place for new research work.

PrEP has not reached women most vulnerable to HIV, women want to learn about PrEP, and when women know about PrEP, they want it. Women want PrEP for themselves, for their daughters, their sisters and their friends.

Investigators in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine have clearly demonstrated that HIV infects and reproduces in macrophages, large white blood cells found in the liver, brain and connective tissues of the body. This discovery has significant implications for HIV cure research....These findings were published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation on March 7.

While incidence rates drop, actual numbers of new infections could rise steeply.

Efforts must also be made to speed up licensure and regulatory approval of the vaginal ring so that women and girls can use it as soon as it is available.

Kenyans could, before the end of this year, have access to a drug that protects them from HIV infection....About 1,000 commercial sex workers are already using the newly-approved HIV/Aids combination therapy drug Truvada (emtricitabine and tenofovir), ahead of its rollout scheduled for later this year....Kenya approved the drug last year...Following the approval, three organisations are conducting demonstration trials on the drug for one year in Nairobi, Kisumu and Homa Bay.

The first atomic-scale view of an interaction between the HIV capsid -- the protein coat that shepherds HIV into the nucleus of human cells -- and a host protein known as cyclophilin A has been illuminated by a recent study. This interaction is key to HIV infection, researchers say. A paper describing the research appears in the journal Nature Communications.

HIV has evolved into a master of avoiding immune system detection by undergoing spontaneous mutations that effectively make it a moving target....But according to a machine learning expert, HIV's mutation-happy defense mechanism also could point to its eventual downfall. David Heckerman,...senior director of the Genomics Group at Microsoft Research, is combining his expertise in computer science with his background as a medical doctor to apply machine learning to the creation of an AIDS vaccine.

Women need daily doses of the antiviral medication Truvada to prevent HIV infection while men only need two doses per week due to the way the drug accumulates in different body tissues, according to a new study from pharmacy researchers the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The two legislators with arguably the most clout over the [NIH] budget...promised yesterday to give NIH “at least” the $1 billion increase President Barack Obama has requested. It would be the second step in “sustained” annual boosts for the agency, said Representative Tom Cole (R–OK) and Senator Roy Blunt (R–MO)....Cole explained: “We want...to make these NIH investments in a regular, manageable, and predictable way so that the scientific community knows they will continue.”

Johnson & Johnson's Janssen announced that a combination therapy of two intramuscular injections of HIV medications administered simultaneously monthly or bimonthly demonstrated comparability to a daily three-drug oral therapy during an ongoing Phase II trial....In general, long-acting injectables can increase compliance compared with oral medication by reducing the frequency of administration.

Our data suggest that pregnant and breastfeeding women who start ART immediately after they are diagnosed with HIV can be retained on ART through the option B+ programme, even after many have stopped breastfeeding. Interventions might be needed to improve retention in the first year on ART in option B+.

This study combines data from the first two rounds [R] of a longitudinal study and in-depth interviews....Most women correctly reported that MC reduces men’s risk of HIV. However, 30% of women at R1, and significantly more (41%) at R2, incorrectly believed MC is fully protective for men against HIV....The proportion of women who believed MC reduces a woman’s HIV risk if she has sex with a man who is circumcised increased significantly (50% to 70%).

Much greater national and global investments in policy and implementation research (PIR) capacity will be required to enable scaling of effective approaches and prevent recycling of failed ideas. Sample questions for PIR research include how to close the gap in delivery of essential services to the poor, which interventions for non-communicable diseases are most applicable in different contexts, and how to engage non-state actors in equitable provision of health services.

The first global survey of women’s representation at the highest level of academia shows that less than one-eighth of the members of science academies around the world are women,...the Academy of Science of South Africa and the InterAcademy Partnership reported on 29 February. The Cuban Academy of Sciences had the highest proportion of women, at 27%, while the Tanzania Academy of Sciences and the Polish Academy of Sciences had the lowest levels, at 4%.

We noted a consistently higher HCV prevalence in HIV-infected individuals than HIV-negative individuals across all risk groups and regions, but especially in people who inject drugs (PWID). This study highlights the importance of routine HCV testing in all HIV-infected individuals, but especially in PWID. There is also a need to improve country-level surveillance of HCV prevalence across different population groups in all regions.