Nigeria begins pilot study on HIV prevention

The country has begun a pilot study of Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) and TasP (Treatment as Prevention). The National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA) is spearheading the study. Pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, is a procedure for people who do not have HIV but who are at substantial risk of contracting the virus to prevent HIV infection by taking a pill every day.

The country decided to test run this because globally PrEP and TasP have been proven to have immense positive effects on the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

According to the Director General of NACA, Prof John Idoko, Multiple Studies have established that anti-retroviral drugs could be used to reduce the rate of infection in a population in these two different ways.

He said, “The pill (brand name Truvada) which contains two medicines (tenofovir and emtricitabine) is used in combination with other medicines to treat HIV. When someone is exposed to HIV through sex or injection drug use, these medicines can work to keep the virus from establishing a permanent infection. Treatment as Prevention or TasP, on the other hand, targets people who are already infected with HIV-1, reducing their infectiousness in the population. Multiple studies have established that, after about the first six months of treatment, anti-retroviral therapy (ART) reduces HIV-1 concentrations to undetectable levels in blood plasma and genital compartments.  Additional studies have demonstrated that HIV transmission by an infected person is significantly reduced when that person adheres to ART well enough to maintain viral suppression.”

Prof Idoko clarified that the ongoing study is not being done to determine whether PrEP works or not as it has long been established that PrEP actually works when used in combination with other methods of HIV prevention.