Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis

An estimated 1.2 million people in the United States live with HIV, of whom 13% do not know their status. Although HIV incidence declined overall by 9% in 2019, there were still 36,801 new HIV diagnoses.

Pre-exposure prophylaxis with Evusheld, combined with aggressive outpatient treatment, may reduce COVID-19 severity in patients with immune-mediated inflammatory disease on B-cell depletion, according to a letter published in RMB Open.

Since the first report of AIDS more than 40 years ago, the fight to end the pandemic has seen successes and failures.

This month’s cover story features an illustrious faculty — Christina Charles-Schoeman, MD, MS; Kathryn Dao, MD; Roy Fleischmann, MD; Jon T. Giles, MD, MPH; and Grace C. Wright, MD, PhD — and highlights the evolution of safety in our field, a phenomenon profoundly influenced by our rich armamentarium of targeted therapies not even dreamed of when I started training.

A nurse-led multidisciplinary initiative targeted at providers and medical staff doubled the number of patients who scheduled a follow-up routine visit for HIV preexposure prophylaxis, or PrEP.

While the long-acting injectable Apretude was more effective at reducing the incidence of HIV than oral emtricitabine-tenofovir disoproxil fumarate, researchers said it does not justify the higher costs associated with it.

HIV PrEP uptake and adherence were low among a cohort of people with opioid use disorder who were undergoing treatment for hepatitis C virus, despite many of them meeting CDC criteria for PrEP use, according to a study.

An intervention for PrEP users and their partners that combined oral HIV self-testing with adherence biofeedback counseling almost doubled the recent adherence to PrEP among postpartum women in South Africa compared with standard of care.

The FDA on Monday approved ViiV Healthcare’s cabotegravir as the first long-acting injectable for HIV PrEP.

Suboptimal COVID-19 vaccination rates in the general population and poor vaccine response in the immunocompromised have forced the rheumatology community to look beyond the specialty in trying to protect vulnerable individuals from the virus.