FDA Reports that Truvada May Be A Safe and Effective HIV Prevention Method

via Bloomberg, by Ryan Flinn and Shannon Pettypiece

Gilead Sciences Inc. (GILD)’s pill Truvada was safe and effective when used to protect uninfected people from getting HIV, U.S. regulators said in a report indicating the main concerns are when and how it should be used.

Truvada was “well tolerated” and its ability to reduce the risk of infection was backed by two studies, the Food and Drug Administration staff said in a report today. Gilead, based in Foster City, California, is seeking to sell the drug as the first pill to keep people from becoming infected.

The FDA asked its advisers to suggest who should get Truvada; what testing would be needed for administration; and what educational material should be used for patients and doctors. The advisers will meet May 10 to discuss the drug, the subject of debates over its appropriate use and cost.

Decisions to prescribe Truvada “should carefully weigh the individual risks for acquiring HIV, their understanding of the importance of adherence to medication, and their potential for development of renal toxicity,” the FDA staff said today in a report on the agency’s website. Education and counseling will be “critically important.”

Gilead fell less than 1 percent to 9:57 a.m. New York time. The FDA isn’t required to follow what the advisory panel suggests.

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[Content that is linked from other sources is for informational purposes and should not construe a Mapping Pathways position.]

Microbicides 2012 Conference: “Someday, our ARV-prevention tools will be as sexy as the I-Phone!”

Original content from the Mapping Pathways blog team

This is the second part of a two-part blog series on highlights and discussions from the Microbicides 2012 conference that recently concluded in Sydney. Here, Jim Pickett re-emphasizes the importance of adherence in clinical trials (a big topic of discussion at the conference) and his optimism about the future of the HIV prevention and treatment landscape. Read Part I here.

MP: Can you give us some examples that illustrate the issues surrounding adherence?

JP: The Partners PrEP trial and the FEM-PrEP trial are good case studies to illustrate the issues surrounding adherence in an HIV prevention clinical trial. Partners PrEP reported very high levels of adherence while the FEM-PrEP trial had to be stopped in April 2011 due to “futility.” Studies later indicated that while many of the FEM-PrEP participants said they adhered to the medication schedule, blood tests indicated that many did not.

A built-in support system and the risk perception of participants are the key here. In Partners PrEP, serodiscordant couples were enrolled together into the trial. One partner was HIV positive while the other was negative. The HIV risk of the HIV-negative partner was not theoretical; it was real. HIV was in their life and they were in it together.

FEM-PrEP involved women recruited on their own, with no consideration whether they were in a serodiscordant relationship – or any relationship for that matter. The risk of HIV was not present in the form of a partner who already had it, but it was, in fact, present in their environment where there was very high HIV incidenceIV HIV . It is interesting that many of these women did not believe themselves to be at a high risk of HIV, despite this high incidence.

Human beings are very good at rationalizing risks and saying “it can never happen to us.” I can drive fast and will never get into a car accident. If I feel a certain behavior is not risky, or that I can “get away with it”, I will not take steps to protect myself.

We don’t want to create tools where only people who are married or in a relationship are able to use the tools successfully. That would be crazy. But we do have to think about how important those social relationships are and use the lessons learned to devise new tools and new trials that give us answers – and develop things that work for all kinds of people, regardless of relationship status, sexual orientation, or whether their potential HIV exposure comes from unprotected vaginal intercourse, unprotected anal intercourse, or from the sharing of syringes during injection drug use.

MP: Are there any trials coming up that you are excited about?

JP: I’m very excited by the upcoming MTN-017 rectal microbicide safety and acceptability trial that will enroll approximately 186 gay men, other men who have sex with men, and transgender women at trial sites in South Africa, Peru, Thailand, and the United States. Participants will go through three eight-week cycles: One cycle of having a daily Truvada tablet, another cycle of applying a “rectal friendly” reformulated tenofovir gel every day, and a cycle of applying the gel before and after having sex.

What impresses me is the level of community involvement sought and obtained to help design this trial. The trial team, and advocates such as myself, visited each of the sites mentioned, had day-long meetings with community members, captured all their observations, and made adjustments to the trial design from the input received. We have to listen to the voices of the communities. We can’t just show up and conduct trials.

MP: What are your other thoughts on the HIV prevention and treatment landscape?

JP: I always like to compare the HIV prevention and treatment landscape to the evolution of computers and phones. Years ago, computers were the size of a house. It took time for the computer to evolve from its clunky beginnings to its current look where we can carry it around in our pocket and it can do more things than we ever could have imagined. Now we have phones and computers that are completely intuitive and easy to use.

Similarly, the HIV landscape has evolved over the years. Before 1996, we had a handful of drugs that didn’t always work great. They were toxic and had to be taken multiple times a day. When protease inhibitors came out in 1996, people near death’s door were brought back to life. But they also had to suffer through a whole host of side effects like nausea, diarrhea, and body disfigurements.

Now, new-age ARV medication can combine three drugs into one pill that has to be taken just once a day. The side effects are minimal and you don’t have to worry about requirements like eating it on a full or empty stomach, or having it refrigerated.

We are now in the clunky computer stage of ARV-based prevention. But, things will keep getting better. We can’t get to the streamlined phase before going through the clunky phase. We have to learn to crawl before we can run. Someday, our ARV prevention tools will be as sexy as the iPhone.

Jim Pickett is the Director of Prevention Advocacy and Gay Men's Health at the AIDS Foundation of Chicago. He is chair of IRMA (International Rectal Microbicide Advocates), and a member of the Mapping Pathways team. Read Part I of Jim’s interview here.

[Content that is linked from other sources is for informational purposes and should not construe a Mapping Pathways position.]

Researchers Report Low Number of People Living with HIV That Adhere to HIV Treatment and Care

via AIDSmeds.com, by Tim Horn

Only one in five people living with HIV meet the criteria for being established and retained in care, according to a new analysis involving 12 clinics across the United States to be published in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes. Though the authors warn that the data involving nearly 23,000 people enrolled in the HIV Research Network are not representative of retention rates in the country, the results nevertheless underscore a need for improvements in keeping those living with the virus connected to care.

As John Fleishman, PhD, of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality in Rockville, MD, and his colleagues write: HIV care is a continuum. One end reflects the estimated 1.2 million people believed to be living with HIV in the United States; the opposite end reflects the low rate (28 percent) of people living with HIV in the country who are successfully engaged in HIV care, receiving antiretroviral therapy and maintaining undetectable viral loads.

Provision of care is problematic at intermediate points in this continuum. “An estimated 21 percent of persons living with HIV in the U.S. are unaware of their infection,” the authors note. “Among those aware of their HIV infection, initial linkage to care is often delayed. After patients have been linked with a provider and have made an initial visit, they must still remain in care, with regular visits over a long time period.”

The study conducted by Fleishman’s group examined these later, but essential, stages in the HIV care continuum, notably rates of establishment and retention in care. These rates were determined using three main measurements.

“Establishment” applied to patients who made follow-up visits for longer than six months after showing up once for HIV care. “Retention” applied to patients who had been seen at least twice at HIV Research Network clinics, with visits separated by 90 days, in each year following their initial visit. The researchers also considered the rate of patients lost to follow-up—those who stopped their HIV Research Network clinic visits without notifications.

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[Content that is linked from other sources is for informational purposes and should not construe a Mapping Pathways position.]

The Importance of Having New Prevention Technologies

via AllAfrica.com

One would wonder why at a time when financing for HIV and Aids is decreasing such that governments are failing to provide treatment to all in need, others continue to channel millions into trials for new prevention technologies.

Others have argued that the world already has preventive interventions that have been proved to work and the billions earmarked for these new interventions for prevention should, for now, be channelled towards scaling up already existing strategies for effective response to the HIV and Aids pandemic.

Statistics from the National Aids Council show that Zimbabwe has 1,2 million people living with HIV and Aids with a prevalence rate of 14,26 percent.

About 60 percent of these are women.

About 347 000 people are on life-prolonging anti-retroviral drugs (ARVs) against a total of 593 168 with CD4 count level of 350 who are in urgent need of treatment.

In terms of funding for treatment, Government says the gap continues to widen in line with set targets. This year alone, Government will need about US$9,1 million to provide treatment to 66 532 people in dire need of ARVs. Some strategies that have already been proved to work include the male and female condom, which is between 94 and 97 percent effective.

Male circumcision and the Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission (PMTCT) have also been proved to prevent HIV transmission by 60 and 50 percent respectively.

Other interventions known to work effectively in combating HIV are behavioural change and blood screening

Read the Rest.


[Content that is linked from other sources is for informational purposes and should not construe a Mapping Pathways position.]

Microbicides 2012 Conference: Adherence – the A-word on everyone’s lips

Original content from the Mapping Pathways blog team

In part I of this two-part blog series, Jim Pickett talks about his experiences at the recently concluded Microbicides 2012 conference in Sydney and the buzz among advocates and trial designers today.

MP: What were some of the highlights for you from the conference?

JP: The conference in itself was great with many interesting and informative presentations. A highlight for me was that conversations about rectal microbicides were integrated throughout the conference and not just in one or two presentations. Rectal microbicides got a lot of attention.

From a Mapping Pathways perspective, we submitted an oral abstract that was accepted and I think the presentation I did was well received. We generated a lot of conversations about the work we have been doing and are planning to do in the upcoming year.

A Canadian colleague presented on their country’s plans for integrating ARV-based prevention into their national prevention plan and one of their planned activities is to develop a Canadian version of Mapping Pathways. This stems from a consultation in Ottawa I participated in last year – so it was gratifying to see Mapping Pathways being picked up by others – and presented at an international conference.

MP: Are there any major themes that emerged from this conference?

JP: Adherence, the A-word, was a very big topic throughout the entire conference. We realized that we have to make HIV-prevention or treatment products people like and will want to adhere to. We have to figure out how tools like PrEP and microbicides fit in people’s lives, and funding should be put in place to better understand what people want, how they have sex, and the role of pleasure, love and intimacy, among many other “real world” realities. Right now, only about two percent of the budget of any study is used for the socio-behavioral aspect – that is, understanding participants’ motivations, documenting adherence, and exploring the communities they are a part of.

Adherence is especially crucial for PrEP to move into the real world. Participants in trials come to the clinic for monthly visits that include a host of prevention services and counseling on condom use and adherence to the study product. If adherence is an issue in such a controlled environment, how big of an issue will it be in the real world where they are not getting that level of intensive support?

A scenario where a trial has to be stopped because people did not take the drug is a major concern because it leaves us more questions than answers. We get no answers on the efficacy of the drug – we are left thinking “what if the person had taken it as instructed?”  We cannot afford to spend millions on trial after trial where we find out finally that people did not take the drug as instructed.

Sure, the lack of adherence could be telling us about acceptability – and if we are making products that people are having a hard time adhering to, is this product really acceptable? By the same token, this is an iterative process – what we have is what we have right now, and the only way to determine if the drug works is if people take it. We can’t improve on the delivery if we can’t answer that question. It is a bit of a conundrum.

MP: What are some of the strategies discussed to tackle the issue of low adherence?

JP: The first step, as mentioned, is to increase funding for the socio-behavioral components of the trial. We need to do better at finding the “right” trial participants. Imagine a case where two people are being recruited for an HIV study trial. One is a person who wants to do the study to the best of his or her abilities and is motivated by the aims of the study. The other person is motivated by the access to healthcare and the little monetary incentive provided by participation in the study. Would both their levels of adherence be the same? This isn’t to cast judgment on anyone – but really, we need to answer the study question – and we can’t do that if people don’t follow the study protocol.

Another interesting strategy being discussed more and more is separating the people who counsel the participants during the trial (adherence counseling) from the people who record user experiences taking, or not taking, the study product. If the same person performs these two functions, participants who form a bond with their adherence counselors during the course of the trial may be unwilling to disclose exactly how well they adhered to the program. The end goal is to find better ways to capture the data and make participants feel completely relaxed about being honest about their user experience. If they did not take the drugs as instructed, that’s ok. But we want to know why.

Jim Pickett is the Director of Prevention Advocacy and Gay Men's Health at the AIDS Foundation of Chicago. He is chair of IRMA (International Rectal Microbicide Advocates), and a member of the Mapping Pathways team. Stay tuned for part II of the blog.

[Content that is linked from other sources is for informational purposes and should not construe a Mapping Pathways position.]