NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Tuesday, February 23, 2016

An insertable vaginal ring containing a month’s supply of a continuous-release HIV prevention drug reduced the risk of HIV in African women by at least 27 percent, a new study found.

The ring works by slowly and continuously delivering a highly localized and controlled amount of the antiretroviral medication dapivirine. This drug aims to halt the ability of HIV – the virus that causes AIDS – to replicate inside a healthy cell. The goal: to prevent HIV infection, rather than treat it, the researchers said.

“These results come after a number of challenging years in the effort to find ways to improve HIV control,” said study lead author Dr. Jared Baeten, a professor in the departments of global health, medicine and epidemiology at the University of Washington in Seattle. “But while the dapivirine vaginal ring isn’t commercially available yet, I’m really very optimistic about our findings, because they show that this type of HIV prevention approach can be quite safe and effective.”