2 DECEMBER 2022 VOLUME 24 ISSUE 48

Robert Suttle was 30 when he was arrested and imprisoned for the felony of “intentional exposure to the AIDS virus”. He had met the man at a gay club on New Year’s Eve 2007 and they had quickly begun a relationship. Suttle says he disclosed his status as HIV-positive to his partner immediately. However, when the couple separated a few months later, the man pressed charges claiming that Suttle had not disclosed his status. Suttle now views this as “retaliation” over the breakup.

The number of HIV tests and people diagnosed with the virus dropped significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new federal data. The report, published Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, looked at data from two commercial laboratories and found decreases during the first half of 2020.

On World AIDS Day, the Biden administration renewed its focus on ending the HIV/AIDS epidemic by 2030, releasing a new five-year strategy for the United States’ global response. The administration said Thursday it is accelerating its response to HIV/AIDS with new global goals including reaching key treatment targets across ages, genders and population groups; supporting UNAIDS targets to reduce new HIV infections; and closing equity gaps for certain groups, including adolescent girls, young women and children.

Arriving at Uganda’s Entebbe airport, I was struck by the miles of carpentry shops on the road to Kampala, building wooden coffins. It was the mid-1980s and I was studying the epicentre of a new condition devastating Africa: AIDS. After infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), people can — after an initial, short, flu-like illness — remain well for several years. But with no treatment, the consequences are eventually always fatal. Around 85 million have been infected, and 40 million have lost their lives so far.

In October, Zimbabwe became the first African country to approve the use of the injectable HIV prevention drug called cabotegravir. A 32-year-old Zimbabwean woman, who requested not to be identified, said she received an injection of the HIV prevention drug while she was working in the United States.

A new, long-lasting drug could be a game-changer for preventing HIV infections, experts say. Advocates are hopeful that those who need it most in low- and middle-income countries will not have to wait for it as long as they have for previous HIV drugs. But questions remain about access and price. The drug is called cabotegravir and is delivered as a shot once every other month. In clinical trials, it did a better job at preventing infection than another option — a pill taken once a day.

HIV prevention pills are becoming more widely available in South Africa and the country is set to soon start piloting the use of an HIV prevention injection and vaginal ring. But merely having these pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) tools available in clinics and other places does not mean people will use them. This dynamic is nothing new.

To commemorate World AIDS Day, News Medical spoke to Dr. Larry Corey, an internationally renowned expert in virology, immunology, and vaccine development, and the former president and director of Fred Hutch, about his work within the field of HIV/AIDS research and vaccine development.

A new ABC News Live special, “Viral: A World Without AIDS,” will look at the history of the HIV/AIDS epidemic from the perspective of people impacted most. The special airs December 1 at 8:30PM ET. ABC News spoke with family members of people who died of AIDS, doctors who have witnessed the transformation in treatment options and people currently living with an HIV diagnosis.

A collaboration between Ghent University in Belgium and Cleveland Clinic's Florida Research & Innovation Center (FRIC) found a new way genetics influences the body's antiviral response by studying a life-threatening disease caused by a common virus: herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV-1). The researchers analyzed genetic data from a patient with immunodeficiency and hospitalized at nine months old with herpes encephalitis, a rare but life-threatening brain inflammation after HSV-1 infection.

Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is an HIV prevention method. It is taken by people who are HIV negative, so that if they are unknowingly exposed to HIV, the drug will prevent the virus from infecting them. The development of this method is important for South Africa because the country is the epicentre of the HIV pandemic. Around 7.5 million people in South Africa live with HIV – about a fifth of the global population of people living with HIV.

Research posted on Open Forum Infectious Diseases showed that individuals with hepatitis C (HCV) may also benefit from pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), considering the overlapping risk factors and methods of transmission with HCV and HIV. Poz noted that in 2012, 68 percent of new HIV cases in the US were men who have sex with men, whereas 7 percent came from injection drug use and 4 percent included both risk factors.

The first clinical trial participant has been treated with an experimental CAR-T cell therapy, a “living drug” that could lead to a functional cure, or long-term HIV remission without antiretroviral drugs, according to an announcement from Caring Cross. The anti-HIV duoCAR-T therapy uses engineered T cells to target HIV-infected immune cells and potentially eliminate the viral reservoir. The study is currently recruiting participants in Sacramento and San Francisco.

Bill Gates, the American business magnate, and philanthropist said his Foundation is working with researchers to come up with a drug that offers 60 days and six months of protection against HIV and which will be available in the next four years. Gates said the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation learnt a lot after developing tenofovir, a drug that was aimed at preventing HIV infections, if taken daily, but it did not succeed beyond the trial stage.

The risk of severe COVID-19 breakthrough within 28 days of a breakthrough infection was low among vaccinated individuals with HIV and those without HIV, according to the results of a study published in JAMA Network Open. Additionally, investigators found that individuals with HIV who have moderate or severe immune suppression have a higher risk of severe breakthrough infections and should be considered a priority for additional vaccine doses and risk-reduction strategies.

For persons living with HIV (PLWH), a three-dose hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccine adjuvanted to a TLR-9 agonist (HepB-CpG) yields 100 person Sero protection, according to a study presented at IDWeek. Kristen Marks, MD, and colleagues examined the immunogenicity of the HBV vaccine HepB-CpG in PLWH. A total of 74 eligible participants without past HBV infection who had CD4 counts of 100 cells/mm3 or greater and HIV-1 RNA of less than 1,000 copies/mL received HepB-CpG at weeks 0, 4, and 24.

The first to die of AIDS was his father, followed by his mother a year later. Like many South Africans in the mid-2000s, Ndumiso Gamede lost his parents in quick succession. Treatment has since stabilised the crisis, but the effects of this "lost generation" are still being felt. Now a rapper, the 28-year-old, who had to raise his younger brothers from the age of 13, shows pictures of his parents hanging on a dimly lit wall in the garage where he lives in the impoverished township of Vosloorus, about 30 km from Johannesburg.

The global COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdown measures have caused disruptions to sexual health services and created additional barriers to the continuity of HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) among key populations. This review provides an examination of the influences of the pandemic on engagement in the PrEP care continuum. Using the PRISMA guideline, 46 studies were included in this review and the synthesis.

Condoms have been the primary form of HIV prevention for gay and bisexual men (GBM) for most of the HIV epidemic. The introduction of biomedical HIV prevention may have changed attitudes towards condoms. Data from repeated national online surveys of GBM in Australia were used to examine how attitudes towards condoms and confidence discussing condoms with partners changed in the period 2011-2019.

Research has begun to examine sexual behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic using quantitative methods, but less is known about the context surrounding these changes using qualitative methods, including corresponding changes in risk reduction methods. This qualitative study, guided by the Integrated Behavioral Model, examines the pandemic's impact on PrEP adherence among young men who have sex with men in Chicago.

South Africa has one of the highest burdens of adolescents with perinatally-acquired HIV (APHIV) in the world. APHIV in South Africa have limited access to sexual and reproductive health (SRH) education and services specific to their HIV status. When lacking comprehensive SRH education, APHIV are prone to sexual risk behaviors that can lead to unintended pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, and HIV transmission.

Understanding stigma is important for improving HIV care services and gaps in HIV service delivery have been attributed to stigma. This review article synthesizes recent evidence on stigma and its implications for HIV service design and delivery. Given the intersectional nature of stigma, we will focus on HIV stigma as well as related forms of stigma based on one's race, sexual identity, sex identity and other identities.

CCTs are currently being explored for HIV prevention among adolescent girls and young women (AGYW) in Southern Africa. However, little is known about how CCT geared towards adolescents’ influence peer relationships, despite evidence that peer relationships form a critical part of development in adolescence. This article presents findings from a qualitative study that explored CCT recipients’ and non-recipients’ perspectives on the impact of CCTs paid to AGYW on peer relationships.

Currently, it is estimated that 37.6 million people are living with the HIV/AIDS virus worldwide, placing HIV/AIDS among the ten leading causes of death, mostly among low- and lower-middle-income countries. Despite the effective intervention in the prevention and treatment, this reduction did not occur equally among populations, subpopulations and geographic regions. This difference in the occurrence of the disease is associated with the social determinants of health (SDH), which could affect the transmission and maintenance of HIV.

HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is a medication that prevents the acquisition of HIV. It has been targeted towards men who have sex with men (MSM). Since its introduction there have been concerns raised around changes in sexual behaviour such as increased condomless anal intercourse (CAI), leading to an elevation in sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

Thailand has been one of the largest migration hubs in Southeast Asia for the past four decades and keeps attracting migrants from neighboring countries. Due to difficulties associated with their status, migration can place individuals at a heightened risk for sexually transmitted diseases. This study aimed to examine factors influencing HIV and syphilis preventive behaviors among Myanmar migrants in Samut Sakhon, Thailand.