Further Studies Confirm Effectiveness of Injectable PrEP for Women

[Jim Allen]

Decent results for PrEP & Injectable PrEP for women 

In full:
https://www.poz.com/article/studies-confirm-effectiveness-injectable-cabotegravir-prep-women

In short:

Further Studies Confirm Effectiveness of Injectable Cabotegravir PrEP for Women

Injectable cabotegravir administered every other month is a highly effective pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) option for women, according to two studies presented at the 11th International AIDS Society Conference on HIV Science (IAS 2021).

The HPTN 084 trial compared the safety and effectiveness of every-other-month injections of cabotegravir versus daily oral Truvada (tenofovir disoproxil fumarate/emtricitabine) in more than 3,000 cisgender women in sub-Saharan Africa. The parallel HPTN 083 study enrolled more than 4,000 gay and bisexual cisgender men and transgender women who have sex with men.

There were just four new cases of HIV among women who used cabotegravir (an annual incidence of 0.21%), compared with 34 among those who used Truvada (an annual incidence of 1.79%). In HPTN 083, cabotegravir injections reduced the risk of infection by 66% compared with Truvada.

But the long-acting injections may be even more effective for women than previously reported.

In the Truvada group, all but one of the women who acquired HIV had poor or inconsistent adherence around the time they tested positive, as shown by pill counts and measurement of tenofovir drug levels. Several of them showed evidence of drug resistance mutations.

In the cabotegravir group, two of the HIV-positive women never actually received the injections (one never showed up for her first injection visit and the other switched to Truvada when she became pregnant). A third woman missed or delayed several injections and had not received a shot for 16 weeks before she tested positive.

The fourth woman already had HIV when she enrolled in the study, retrospective testing showed.

After reclassifying the woman who already had HIV, the revised incidence was 0.15% for the cabotegravir group and 1.85% for the Truvada group, reflecting a 92% risk reduction.