Ever since combination antiretroviral therapy (ART) was introduced in 1996, HIV has been transformed from a fatal diagnosis to a chronic and manageable condition for many people. ART made it possible for…
Have we really turned the corner over HIV/AIDS?
Africa Studio
Two years ago, the “beginning of the end” of AIDS was announced. It included the promise of reducing HIV transmission by reducing the amount of infectious virus in the population. This relies on a two-pronged…
The proposed Australian price for Sovaldi has not been disclosed, but in the United States a three-month course of treatment costs US$84,000.
Stuart Hamilton/Flickr
It’s twice as common as type 1 diabetes. It kills more Australians than HIV. One in every 100 of us lives with hepatitis C, but the disease receives little attention. Worldwide, around 150 million people…
HIV is one of the deadliest viruses encountered by humans in recent history and will kill 1.5m people this year alone, compare this to Ebola, for example, which has killed less than 5,000 so far, and you…
No tech here…
Stack of hands image via shutterstock.com
Foundation essay: This article is part of a series marking the launch of The Conversation in the US. Our foundation essays are longer than our usual comment and analysis articles and take a wider look…
Technology has done away with the need to insert swabs into the male urethra and speculums into the vagina. Instead, blood and urine are tested.
In Tune/Shutterstock
Sexuality is a means of pleasure, fulfilment and intimate connection with other humans. But it can also be a source of anguish. So it’s perhaps no surprise that of all the areas in health care, the “STI…
Like some other viruses, HIV hides in various places in the body, including in long-lived immune cells like this one.
NIAID/Flickr
A second case of a baby who was ostensibly “cured” of HIV after early treatment has been discounted as a possible breakthrough in fighting the disease. The case of an Italian baby who relapsed after appearing…
One of the most effective methods used by HIV to evade control is to hide from the immune system. We’re getting to know much more about how the virus does this and research has revealed how normal bacteria…
The “shock and kill” approach flushes out the infected cells in hiding
Bo Insogna/Flickr
Reema Rattan, The Conversation e Alexandra Miller, The Conversation
A combination of four drugs can flush out HIV-infected cells from hidden reservoirs in the body and kill them with a boost to the immune system, according to research published in the journal Cell today…
From the late 1990s, the world galvanised in support of dramatic increases in funding for the distribution of HIV treatments to all who needed them.
World national flags/Shuttershock
When AIDS first emerged in the early 1980s, HIV infection was a death sentence. But a global effort has ensured this is no longer the case for a growing number of people. The good news today is that the…
HIV-prevention campaigns need to do more than simply urge people to use condoms.
charnsitr/Shutterstock
Australia had a quick and effective response to HIV at the start of the epidemic. Some 30 years later, however, there’s a tendency to underestimate the sheer effort involved in maintaining HIV prevention…
HIV epidemics have grave implications for the world’s Indigenous cultures.
Flickr: j h
Indigenous people are estimated to comprise 4.5% of the total global population. They are often overrepresented in HIV data and recognise themselves as being particularly vulnerable to HIV. In Canada…
A coloured electron micrograph image of HIV infecting a human cell.
Flickr: NIAID
One of the greatest success stories in modern medicine is that HIV is no longer a death sentence, but a chronic, manageable disease that often can be managed with a single tablet a day. Antiretroviral…
The “Mississippi baby” – a child who generated a great deal of excitement last year after being seemingly cured of HIV – now has detectable levels of HIV in the blood, according to doctors and health officials…
Joep Lange (right) with Praphan Phanuphak and David Coope.
Kirby Institute
Dutch professor of medicine Joep Lange and his partner Jacqueline van Tongeren were among the 298 people who perished in Malaysia Airlines flight 17 after it was struck down on the Russian-Ukraine border…
Despite the increase in HIV diagnoses, media coverage of this important health issue remains patchy and sensationalist.
Flickr: Tom
Research has shown that if used effectively, the media can play an important role in lessening fear and stigma about HIV – the biggest obstacles to seeking information and treatment about the disease…
In most developed countries, including Australia, gay and bisexual men dominate numbers of new HIV infections.
Aleksandar Stojkovic/Flickr
The number of new HIV diagnoses in Australia remains the highest in 20 years, according to data released today by UNSW’s Kirby Institute. While rates have remained stable over the past two years, the number…
Three decades since the onset of the infection in a global population, HIV care and treatment is looking very different. Given the difficulties involved, it is remarkable that having developed good treatments…
Maintaining a steady pace of scientific discoveries and breakthroughs is critical for HIV prevention and treatment.
Alba Campus/Flickr
The field of HIV treatment and prevention has been freshly energised by the findings from several recent clinical trials. Maintaining the momentum of scientific discoveries and breakthroughs is critical…
Director, The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, The University of Melbourne and Royal Melbourne Hospital and Consultant Physician, Department of Infectious Diseases, Alfred Hospital and Monash University, The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity
Professor of medicine and deputy director of the Desmond Tutu HIV Centre at the Institute of Infectious Disease and Molecular Medicine, University of Cape Town
Dean Faculty of Health Sciences and Professor of Vaccinology at University of the Witwatersrand; and Director of the SAMRC Vaccines and Infectious Diseases Analytics Research Unit, University of the Witwatersrand