New Drug May Help Prevent HIV Infection

Sep, 2020 - By SMI

The research was conducted to determine the safety and effectiveness of the new drug named cabotegravir to prevent HIV infection.

Large-scale research testing the effectiveness of a new drug designed to curb HIV, a virus that damages the immune system due to a combination of preliminary data of positive infection and disruptions caused by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19 pandemic). The researchers suggest that one injection provides better protection from HIV compared to currently available medicines. However, after every 8 weeks, a person needs an injection. A new drug named cabotegravir is found to be effective and safe in preventing HIV infection among individuals who have sex with gay men, men, and transgender women.

Moreover, UNAIDS (Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS) has also warmly welcomed the announcement of the new drug. During this research, the team from the HIV Prevention Trials Network recruited around 4600 HIV-negative individuals from over 40 sites in Africa, Asia, South America, and North America. According to UNAIDS, in 2018, there were around 1.7 million new HIV cases, 54% of which were among the major population and their partners, including individuals who have sex with sex workers, people in prison, people who inject drugs, clients of sex workers, transgender women, gay men, and normal men of other key populations.

According to Myron Cohen, co-investigator of this new research, every year, around 1.7 million individuals get infected with HIV. Cohen also noted that more options are necessary to prevent the infection and to lower that number. The research was conducted to determine the safety and effectiveness of the new drug named cabotegravir to prevent HIV infection against the current standard of care. A trail named HPTN 083 focused on transgender women and cisgender men who have sex with men, whereas a companion trial named HPTN 084, is still in process.