WHO recommends Gilead's twice-yearly injection for HIV prevention
The recommendation, issued at the International AIDS Conference in Kigali, Rwanda, comes nearly a month after the U.S. health regulator approved the drug, giving patients new hope of interrupting virus transmission.
The twice-yearly injectable offers a long-acting alternative to daily oral pills and other shorter-acting options, reshaping the response to the disease especially among those who face challenges with daily adherence, stigma, or access to health care
"While an HIV vaccine remains elusive, lenacapavir is the next best thing," said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General.
The WHO's recommendations come at a critical moment as HIV prevention efforts stagnate with 1.3 million new HIV infections occurring in 2024 as funding challenges, stigma around the disease persist.
These infections disproportionately impact populations such as sex workers, men who have sex with men, transgender people, people who inject drugs, people in prisons, and children and adolescents.
WHO has also recommended a public health approach to HIV testing using HIV rapid tests that would remove a major access barrier by eliminating complex and costly procedures.
Lenacapavir, part of a class of drugs known as capsid inhibitors, proved nearly 100% effective at preventing HIV in large trials last year.
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The Guardian
10 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Why the US is burning $10m worth of birth control
There are few better metaphors for the receding status of American women than one offered up by the Trump administration at a medical waste disposal facility outside Paris this week: rather than distribute nearly $10m worth of birth control, which had been purchased by USAID and was destined to be given to women in low-income countries, primarily in Africa, the Americans decided to burn it. The incinerated contraceptives included 900,000 birth control implants, 2m doses of injectable long-acting birth control, 2m packs of contraceptive pills and 50,000 IUDs. The medicine is just the latest in the far-reaching fallout from cuts made by the so-called 'department of government efficiency,' or Doge, a project in which Elon Musk and a group of his very young, overwhelmingly male acolytes unilaterally slashed congressionally appropriated funding to government programs they did not like. The cuts have been devastating for non-profits that work to improve women's health and safety worldwide. Sarah Shaw, an associate director at the global family planning group MSI Reproductive Choices, says that the cuts will put women at risk as they strain their health with unplanned pregnancies and seek out illegal abortions; other women who are denied access to birth control will lose out on the opportunities for education, professional development or remunerative work that can help them escape abuse, rise out of poverty, pursue their talents and ambitions and better provide for the children they already have. When MSI attempted to buy the contraceptives, the administration would only accept full price, which the organization couldn't afford, she said. Several non-profits, including MSI, had offered to pay to ship and repackage the supplies, according to another representative. But the Trump administration refused, partially due to federal rules the prohibit the US from providing such goods to groups that perform, provide referrals for or offer education about abortions. In addition to the cost of purchasing the contraceptives, American taxpayers will now be on the hook for about $167,000 for the cost of burning them. It's just the latest in a series of signs that the Trump administration is turning against the provision of birth control, particularly the safe, effective and woman-controlled hormonal methods that have been a cornerstone of healthcare policy for decades and which were a precondition of women's advancement in work and education over the past 60 years. In April, the Trump administration abruptly announced that it was suspending a large swath of the domestic service grants distributed under Title X, the program meant to help low-income Americans access birth control, STD treatment and other sexual and reproductive healthcare. Of the 86 Title X grants awarded for fiscal year 2024, nearly 25% were 'temporarily withheld', mostly based on highly suspect allegations that the grant-receiving institutions – including 13 Planned Parenthood affiliates – had failed to comply with Trump executive orders banning things like DEI programs. Eight states now receive zero Title X dollars: California, Hawaii, Maine, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, Tennessee and Utah. Alaska, Minnesota and Pennsylvania have also lost most of their contraception funding. The domestic cuts – along with the exclusion of Planned Parenthood clinics from Medicaid reimbursements – mean that American women, too, are now facing dramatically greater obstacles to accessing birth control. Clinics that relied on Title X funding are now set to close: 11 Planned Parenthood clinics already have, including in Democratically controlled states like California. Planned Parenthood says that cumulatively, the cuts could lead the organization to close about 200 of its 600 clinics nationwide – a devastating cut to abortion providers in particular that will make a wide range of reproductive services inaccessible to women regardless of where they live. But the Trump administration is not merely forcing these programs for women's health and dignity go up in flames. They are redirecting them to better suit their preferred cultural outcome: one in which women's lives, ambitions and talents are all subordinated to the task of childbearing. The New York Times reported last month that the White House is redirecting Title X funds that once went to birth control to instead fund an 'infertility training center' and programs in something called 'restorative reproductive medicine'. 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With its dramatic cuts to contraceptive funding at home and abroad, the Trump administration is making its values clear. It does not value women's health; it does not value their dignity, their control over their own lives, their aspirations, their earning potential, their desire to be freed from ignorance, or poverty, or the abuse they suffer under the hands of husbands and fathers. It does not value their ability to control their own bodies, and by extension, it does not value their ability to enter the public sphere. It does not value their dreams, their gifts, their hard work or invention or aspiration to anything other than making babies. American women, like women everywhere, depend on birth control to live lives of freedom and to pursue their dreams. But because of the Trump administration, those dreams are going up in smoke. Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist
The Guardian
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Sir David Nabarro obituary
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David was educated at Oundle school, Northamptonshire, before studying medicine at Worcester College, Oxford, and University College hospital, London. He joined WHO in 1999, working first on malaria and later, alongside the director-general Gro Harlem Brundtland on the creation of the global fund to fight Aids, tuberculosis and malaria, which has since saved millions of lives. In 2003 he survived the bombing of the Canal hotel in Baghdad while serving as WHO representative for health action in crises. He was appointed senior UN system coordinator for avian influenza (bird flu) in 2005, establishing him as a pioneer in pandemic preparedness. His most visible role on the international stage came in 2014 when he coordinated an unprecedented response to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. Facing a situation where 'the number of people getting sick was doubling every week', he helped bring the epidemic under control by engaging the community, building trust and addressing social and economic factors alongside delivering medical aid. Championing the synergy between social and medical interventions stands as the legacy of his lifetime of service. In 2019 he became co-director, with me, of the Institute of Global Health Innovation at Imperial College London, a role to which he brought his vast operational experience, remarkable ability to build consensus among diverse stakeholders, and readiness to mentor young researchers. His office was always open to students and colleagues seeking guidance, and his generous spirit enriched the academic community. Nabarro is survived by his second wife, Florence Lasbennes, whom he married in 2019, and by five children – two sons and a daughter from a relationship with Susanna Graham-Jones, and a daughter and son from his marriage to Gillian Holmes, which ended in divorce – and seven grandchildren. David Nunes Nabarro, global health strategist, born 26 August 1949; died 26 July 2025
BBC News
6 hours ago
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Nigerian nurses don call off nationwide strike
National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives (NANNM) don call off dia ongoing strike. Di strike wey start on Wednesday bin cause di shutdown of operations for many hospitals as many patients also suffer from a lack of proper health care. Di association bin ask dia members make dem down dia tools until August 5, 2025. Di association start dia seven-day warning strike on July 29, 2025, accusing di goment say dem refuse to act on di 15-day ultimatum, dem bin issue on July 14. Minister of Health, Prof Ali Pate, on Friday confam say di nursing association don call off di strike afta one brief meeting wit di association. Tashikalmah Hallah di tok-tok pesin to di Nigerian Minister of Health and Social Welfare also confam give BBC say dem don call off di strike. "We just finish di meeting wit di nurses dem don gree to call off di strike immediately," di tok-tok pesin say. Meanwhile, di association no gree make any comment on di strike afta di close door-meeting. Di association dey demand for beta work condition, and di goment unwillingness to address dia issues. Di association dem demand for improve welfare packages, equitable allowances, and betta working environments for nurses wey dey work for federal health facilities. BBC Pidgin bin report say di strike don affect activities for Accident and Emergency ward for University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital.
