The US State Department on Thursday announced it is bringing a new anti-HIV injection to market in several countries with high levels of the virus.
Under the plan, Gilead Sciences, which makes the long-acting HIV prevention drug lenacapavir, will provide the medication to up to 12 countries. The State Department did not identify those nations.
Jeremy Lewin, senior State Department official for foreign assistance, humanitarian affairs and religious freedom, said the US and the Global Fund to fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria initially hope to get two million people on the medication over the next three years.
“But we could easily see several times that if manufacturing can scale quickly,” Mr Lewin told reporters.
The US is providing the medication through Pepfar, the global Aids relief fund formed by then-president George W Bush.
Pregnant and breastfeeding mothers will initially be given priority to receive the medication. President Donald Trump's administration has set a goal of ending mother-to-child HIV transmission by the end of his second term.
“This is a really significant moment in history of the fight against HIV/Aids,” said Peter Sands, executive director of the Global Fund, who also attended the briefing.
“This is an opportunity to significantly reduce the 1.3 million new HIV infections there are every year. If we can reduce that, we can change the nature of the HIV/Aids pandemic quite dramatically.”
The medication is given in a twice-yearly injection. More than 99 per cent of people in clinical trials remained HIV-negative while on the drug, according to Gilead.
Gilead is providing the drug at no profit, Mr Lewin said.
“Gilead is very generously offering us a product at no cost, so we're not going to give away exactly what their cost per dose is, but we're grateful to them for offering it at a price that makes this possible. The US commitment is significant,” Mr Lewin said.
