Posted on October 21, 2016
Source: The Baltimore Sun
"Many of the people most at risk of contracting HIV in Baltimore know nothing about a drug that is 92 percent effective in preventing the infection, according to new research from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Only about 40 percent of gay and bisexual men with no HIV diagnosis had heard of pre-exposure prophylaxis medication, or PrEP, according to findings published this month in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
Even men who had recently visited a doctor or been tested for a sexually transmitted disease were not told about the PrEP drug, a daily pill recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for people at high risk of contracting HIV.
Use of the drug is seen by many public health officials as key to significantly reducing, and maybe one day even stopping, the spread of HIV, which has no cure. The pill, sold under the brand name Truvada, is a mix of two medicines used to treat HIV. It was approved by the FDA in July 2012 for pre-exposure protection against the virus that causes AIDS."
