AVAC Report 2013 – Research & Reality
We identify progress and gaps in large-scale human trials, rollout of proven options and ongoing research for new advances that women and men will want to use.
The Report pays particular attention to the needs of women and girls in an in-depth chapter titled A Field on the Verge of Change: What it will take to find new prevention options for women. Citing recent trials that failed to provide conclusive answers due to low use of products in the studies, we lay out key steps to creating a revamped development agenda for female-initiated methods including vaginal gels, rings and other strategies.
In the second section of the Report – Research Reality Checks – we take a brief look at several prevention research domains where the ideal conditions of research are colliding with unruly realities.
The Report urges researchers, donors and implementers to step up plans for large-scale delivery of recently proven methods for women and men, including pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and non-surgical male circumcision devices. While pilot studies of these options are in progress, a lack of longer-range plans for program scale-up and rollout means that valuable time, and lives, could be lost.
It also calls for commitment to large-scale clinical trials to advance the AIDS vaccine field and the arena of hormonal contraception and HIV risk. Both areas require funding, clear messaging and smart trial designs.
This Report is designed for stakeholders working on different technologies, and at every stage of the “research-to-rollout” continuum that encompasses the many steps between an initial scientific concept and a new option offered in an effective public health program. Advocacy is needed at every stage. It is critical to sustain support for research to develop game-changing tools such as microbicides or an AIDS vaccine; pilot projects that demonstrate the impact of emerging tools like PrEP; and public health programs that deliver combination prevention including treatment as prevention and voluntary medical male circumcision (VMMC) for maximum impact.
Author
Republish this article
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Unless otherwise noted, you can republish our articles for free under a Creative Commons license. Here’s what you need to know:
-
You have to credit Health-e News. In the byline, we prefer “Author Name, Publication.” At the top of the text of your story, include a line that reads: “This story was originally published by Health-e News.” You must link the word “Health-e News” to the original URL of the story.
-
You must include all of the links from our story, including our newsletter sign up link.
-
If you use canonical metadata, please use the Health-e News URL. For more information about canonical metadata, click here.
-
You can’t edit our material, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. (For example, “yesterday” can be changed to “last week”)
-
You have no rights to sell, license, syndicate, or otherwise represent yourself as the authorized owner of our material to any third parties. This means that you cannot actively publish or submit our work for syndication to third party platforms or apps like Apple News or Google News. Health-e News understands that publishers cannot fully control when certain third parties automatically summarise or crawl content from publishers’ own sites.
-
You can’t republish our material wholesale, or automatically; you need to select stories to be republished individually.
-
If you share republished stories on social media, we’d appreciate being tagged in your posts. You can find us on Twitter @HealthENews, Instagram @healthenews, and Facebook Health-e News Service.
You can grab HTML code for our stories easily. Click on the Creative Commons logo on our stories. You’ll find it with the other share buttons.
If you have any other questions, contact info@health-e.org.za.
AVAC Report 2013 – Research & Reality
by healthe, Health-e News
December 10, 2013