{"id":20182,"date":"2019-06-11T16:14:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-11T16:14:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/associatednews.us\/content\/2019\/06\/11\/expert-panel-recommends-wider-use-of-daily-pill-to-prevent-hiv-infections\/"},"modified":"2019-06-11T16:14:00","modified_gmt":"2019-06-11T16:14:00","slug":"expert-panel-recommends-wider-use-of-daily-pill-to-prevent-hiv-infections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/associatednews.us\/content\/expert-panel-recommends-wider-use-of-daily-pill-to-prevent-hiv-infections\/","title":{"rendered":"Expert Panel Recommends Wider Use Of Daily Pill To Prevent HIV Infections"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Allison Aubrey<\/a><\/span> <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n <\/a><\/div>\n
\n
\n
\n Enlarge this image<\/a>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n
\n

\n In 2012, the Food and Drug Administration approved the use of Truvada to prevent HIV infection in people at high risk.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Justin Sullivan\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

<\/b>
\n hide caption<\/b><\/b>\n <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

toggle caption<\/b><\/b>\n <\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

Justin Sullivan\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

<\/span>\n<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force has a new recommendation aimed at preventing HIV infections and AIDS. The influential panel’s guidance<\/a> says people at high risk of being infected with HIV should be offered preventive antiretroviral medications \u2014 taken in a daily pill.<\/p>\n

There’s lots of evidence that preexposure prophylaxis \u2014 also known as PrEP \u2014 is effective. The Food and Drug Administration-approved pill Truvada contains two antiretroviral medicines (tenofovir and emtricitabine). <\/p>\n

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cites evidence that PrEP can reduce the risk of HIV infection by up to 92% <\/a>in people who are at high risk and who take the drug consistently. <\/p>\n

The CDC recommended PrEP several years ago and calls it “a powerful HIV prevention tool<\/a>,” but so far uptake of PrEP has been slow. <\/p>\n

“Currently, less than 10% of individuals with an indication for PrEP are receiving this medication,” write Hyman Scott and Paul Volberding in an editorial published Tuesday alongside<\/a> the new recommendation in the medical journal JAMA.<\/em> Both authors are physicians and researchers at the University of California, San Francisco who have been involved in HIV research.<\/p>\n