Ending HIV/AIDS: Not as close as many would have us believe

摘要

To the Editor: Declarations regarding the global elimination of HIV(the end of AIDS) would suggest that current efforts at preventionand treatment are close to being 100% effective.[1] The widespreadroll-out and success of antiretroviral therapy (ART) for treating HIV,the promise of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and the universaltest-and-treat approach support such claims. In South Africa (SA),the success of programmes regarding prevention of mother-tochild-transmission(PMTCT) and a plethora of community-widecombination prevention programmes, suggest a slowing of HIVacquisition, also pointing to the end of HIV/AIDS. However, therecent publication of the failed PopART (effect of universal testingand treatment on HIV incidence) study[2] and continuing newinfections within our longitudinal work in SA, suggest little slowing,let alone elimination, as we indicate below.