We’re now three decades deep into battling the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and humankind has, for the most part, found ways to live with the virus. That doesn’t mean we’re totally out of the woods, though – hundreds of Australians are diagnosed every year, and have to maintain a strict regimen of treatments to cope with it.
Announced today – World AIDS Day, ICYMI – the trial is looking to incorporate 3,000 people at the most risk of contracting the virus and supplying them with the “PrEP” pill.
Experts are already stoked on the trial, with UNSW’s Research Professor Andrew Grulich calling it the “best chance of really hitting this epidemic on the head” he had come across in 20 years.
He says that when it’s taken daily, the treatment is nearly 100% effective, and anything even coming close to those numbers when talking about AIDS is a huge deal. The university’s Kirby Institute is so confident, they say the pill could end transmissions in the state by 2020.
@NSWHealth Minister Jillian Skinner launches new NSW HIV Strategy 2016-2020 and announces new #PrEP trial #EndingHIV pic.twitter.com/bHaKXfxtH6
— ENDING HIV (@ENDINGHIV) November 30, 2015
