Can We Treat Our Way Out of the AIDS Epidemic?
With no cure or vaccine in sight, HIV/AIDS remains a devastating epidemic, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa where nearly 70% of new HIV infections occur. To curb HIV/AIDS, researchers have proposed a strategy to use drug treatment to decrease new transmissions so much that the epidemic eventually dies out. The concept requires changes in standards of when anti-retroviral therapy begins and who receives it. Could “treatment as prevention” prove to be the strategy to finally end the AIDS epidemic?