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Thursday, August 6, 2015

An experimental vaginal gel containing a drug used to treat the AIDS virus could prevent half of cases of genital herpes, according to a study done in South Africa.

Among women who used tenofovir gel, the annual rate of infection with the genital herpes virus, known as herpes simplex virus type 2 or HSV-2, was 10.2 percent versus a rate of 21 percent for women who used a placebo gel.

If the gel were to be approved and manufactured, and “if a woman was concerned about acquiring herpes simplex virus type 2, this would be the best protection available,” chief author Dr. Salim Abdool Karim of the Centre for the AIDS Program of Research in South Africa told Reuters Health.