Having survived the HIV/AIDS pandemic, gay communities in the US were well equipped to get residents health and social services early in the pandemic, when the government’s COVID-19 response lagged.
Not achieving the targets for children and adolescents in sub-Saharan Africa means that new infections will continue to increase and HIV related mortality will be a reality for decades to come.
The key actions needed to end AIDS are relatively clear. The question is whether every government, funder, and implementing organisations will apply them.
Scientists developed vaccines for COVID-19 in a matter of months. Why after 37 years do we still not have one for HIV/AIDS? On HIV Vaccine Awareness Day, it’s an important question to ask.
Local and national governments in west and central African countries must prioritise investment in providing access to HIV testing for all pregnant women.
The HIV/AIDS response played out over a much longer trajectory than COVID-19. But it is, in some respects, a shining example of what can be achieved when countries and people work together.
The giant leap in the number of people accessing HIV treatment would not have been possible without task shifting from medical doctors to less-specialised cadres such as nurses and midwives.
As it toured schools, the play Talk to Me, about two friends and HIV, was able to create brave and safe spaces for conversation about a challenging subject.
One of the main challenges remains that diagnostics and drugs for people suffering from advanced HIV aren’t readily available. This group of people is vulnerable to deadly opportunistic infections.
Male involvement in prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV is key for the uptake of services and retention in care. When men are involved, HIV exposed or infected children do better.
As ready as you are to be done with COVID-19, it’s not going anywhere soon. A historian of disease describes how once a pathogen emerges, it’s usually here to stay.
Pooled testing, or group testing, has been used to diagnose relatively rare conditions, such as infection in blood donors. It could be used for universal early infant diagnosis and viral load testing.
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
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
Associate Professor, Public Health & Social Policy; Special Advisor Health Research, Office of the Vice-President Research and Innovation, University of Victoria