Devex Reporter Sophie Edwards broke down the six biggest stories from AIDS 2018. Here are the key takeaways (and read the full piece here).
Reaching key populations. Peter Piot, founding director of UNAIDS, reminded the audience that the 90-90-90 targets set by UNAIDS in 2014 will miss 27 percent of HIV patients. He said the remaining 10-10-10 — people who will determine the future of the epidemic — are likely to be key populations less likely to access services because of barriers such as stigma and criminalization, including LGBT individuals, people who use drugs, sex workers, and young people.
- The prevention crisis. Prevention has traditionally received little HIV funding, but there was new buzz around the prevention agenda, in part driven by excitement around oral pre-exposure prophylaxis.
- The youth bulge. Adolescents face a disproportionately high risk of becoming infected with HIV, especially in Africa, where the population is set to rapidly increase and new infection rates are on the rise among adolescents.
- Integration. While HIV programming has traditionally been siloed due to having its own funding streams, the conversation has turned toward integrating HIV programming into broader health care. This was a key point in a The Lancet Commission report, in the message delivered by WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, and alluded to by former President Bill Clinton.
- Concerns remain for vaccines. Concerns about the so-called "wonder drug" dolutegravir sparked debate among conference goers about whether women of childbearing age should be prescribed the drug; we also saw new data from the APPROACH study, which is evaluating the safety of several different HIV vaccines currently undergoing clinical trials.
- The Trump effect. The shadow of U.S. President Donald Trump's beefed-up "global gag rule," also known as the Mexico City Policy, loomed large. Unlike previous iterations of the policy, Trump's version is applied to almost all U.S. global health assistance, including PEPFAR.