“Combination Prevention” Gains Ground as High Priority

While the discussions in the scientific sessions at this year’s International AIDS Conference focused largely on HIV treatment, the underlying challenge being debated more informally among participants was the global reality that, in the past 2 years, five new HIV infections have occurred for every two people initiated on antiretroviral therapy. Setting the stage for such discourse, Myron Cohen detailed, in his plenary address, the scope of prevention through the life-course of HIV infection, highlighting the potential preventive role of antiretroviral drugs, either as microbicides or as oral preexposure prophylaxis. Geoff Garnett added further insight by outlining the complexities of HIV epidemics and described how mathematical modeling ca…