This agreement will provide access to an injectable version of Cabotegravir. (Represent)
Geneva:
The Unitaid and the Medicines Patent Pool announced on Thursday that it has reached an agreement to allow the distribution of a low-cost generic version of a long-term prophylactic treatment against HIV in low-income countries.
The agreement will allow ViiV Healthcare, a subsidiary of British pharmaceutical giant GSK, to allow selected manufacturers to produce generic versions of Cabotegravir LA, the pre-exposure prophylaxis treatment. long-acting PrEP for HIV.
The deal will provide access to an injectable version of Cabotegravir, which has been shown to provide two months of protection against infection, in 90 countries where more than 70% of all new HIV infections are reported, Unitaid said. happens in 2020.
Unitaid spokeswoman Herve Verhoosel said: “Access to an effective, long-acting HIV prevention option can significantly contribute to the goal of ending HIV transmission and ending the pandemic by 2030. “.
He added: “Efforts to increase access to Cabotegravir LA for PrEP will have a particular impact on groups with particularly high rates of infection, such as men who have sex with men and sex workers. prostitution.
The news comes a day after a new report presented at the International AIDS Conference in Montreal, Canada, found that the global fight against HIV has stalled due to shrinking resources due to COVID-19 and other crises.
About 1.5 million new infections occurred last year – one million more than the global targets to fight the virus.
The long-acting Cabotegravir injection is only recently available and has been shown to be much more effective than the daily oral form.
But the cost — a year’s worth of treatment of $22,000 in the United States earlier this year — is an obstacle to widespread rollout in all high-income countries.
Unitaid is a global health initiative that works to ensure equitable access to health innovations in low- and middle-income countries.
The Drug Patent Foundation, founded by Unitaid and backed by the United Nations, works to license drugs needed for general distribution in low- and middle-income countries.
(Except for the title, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from an aggregated feed.)
