According to UNAIDS, South Africa is the most hard-hit country by the HIV epidemic. Currently, the country has 7.7 million people living with HIV. This year South Africa’s health officials hope that a new drug they expect to be long-acting will help prevent HIV infection. The health officials believe the new drug will be a turning point for the fight against the global threat eclipsed by the coronavirus pandemic.
New Drug Cabotegravir
President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa spoke to journalists, drawing attention to the fact that the new long-term acting and injectable HIV drug could significantly strengthen the epidemic’s response. In his message, he noted, however, the country’s battle against HIV had suffered because of the coronavirus pandemic. The coronavirus outbreak in different countries across Africa has caused a strain on health services. Because of this, it has been hard for countries with a high HIV/AIDS prevalence like South Africa to move forward with health-related research.
Before the coronavirus outbreak last year, some men and women took part in separate studies, including one by the HIV Prevention Trials Network. The Reproductive Health and HIV Institute (RHI) at the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa also participated in the study. During the study, all the men and women taking part were given shots of the new drug Cabotegravir. The drug proved to be 90% more effective than the daily pill known as PrEP. These results showed the researchers that the drug was a success in the trials. More than 3,200 women and men from research sites in South Africa, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Uganda, Kenya, and Eswatini participated in the clinical trials.
Increase in Number of Infections in South Africa
This year on World Aids Day, the UNAIDS executive director Winnie Byanyima expressed in her message that she feared the world was losing focus on the Aids pandemic. In South Africa, figures showed 225,000 new HIV/AIDS infections in the country’s largest province Gauteng. Miss Winnie said they believed there was an increase in infections because of the difficulties in accessing care during the coronavirus pandemic.
With the increase in the number of infections, health officials hold on to the hope that Cabotegravir will provide a solution. They believe Cabotegravir could mean fewer visits to health centers as many look to reduce their exposure to COVID-19. There is no treatment for HIV yet anywhere in the world. But the health officials and those infected in South Africa believe the new drug is a significant development. Some say that the drug could provide the key long needed to end HIV/AIDS as a public health threat.
Women in sub-Saharan Africa are among those who will greatly benefit from the Cabotegravir drug. Women in the region are disproportionately affected by the HIV pandemic. Most of them lack access to daily PrEp pills. If health care workers provide Cabotegravir to them, it will be much easier for them to protect themselves. Additionally, the injection drug will only require them to take it every eight weeks.
GlaxoSmithKline, with Pfizer Inc and Shionogi Limited own Viiv Healthcare, which developed the Cabotegravir drug. The U.S National Institutes of Health, ViiV, and Melinda Gates sponsored the study for the drug.
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