YOUTHLEAD report back on the UNAIDS High Level Meeting to End AIDS

At the UN High Level Meeting to End AIDS (HLM) in New York, civil society played a vital role in advocating for the needs of key populations, in particular stressing the urgent need for the greater inclusion specific communities affected by HIV within the document.  

AFAO spoke to one of the civil society delegates at the meeting, Jeffry Acaba, about his thoughts on the outcome of the meeting and what the next steps for civil society organisations will be.

Report back: UN High Level Meeting on AIDS

L-R: Darryl O'Donnell, Sharon Lewin,
Cipri Martinez.

It’s been an intense few days in New York, as government heads of state, ministers of health and civil society congregated in New York for the High Level Meeting on Ending AIDS (HLM).

The Australian Delegation to the meeting included AFAO CEO Darryl O’Donnell; President of the National Association of People with HIV Australia (NAPWHA), Cipri Martinez; and leading Australian HIV cure researcher and head of the Doherty Institute, Professor Sharon Lewin.

AFAO's Finn O'Keefe reports.

PrEP can help us end HIV

It’s not often that a drug’s product information sheet would be cause for excitement, let alone celebration, writes AFAO Executive Director Darryl O'Donell. 

Yet just as experts met in Sydney on 6 May to discuss HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, Australia’s drug regulator quietly changed the product sheet for the drug Truvada to approve its use to prevent HIV.

This change by Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration means that doctors can now write a script for Truvada and it can be dispensed at a chemist. This is groundbreaking because it means Australia’s drug technocrats have said that Truvada is safe, and that it works in preventing sexual transmission of HIV.