New approaches to HIV prevention.

Abstract

Just as the 1996 International AIDS Conference in Vancouver ushered in the era of effective combination antiretroviral therapy and the 2000 meeting in Durban focused on the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the developing world, the 2006 conference (held August 13-18 in Toronto) may be remembered as the one that brought HIV prevention to the fore. Political considerations aside, it has become abundantly clear that efforts to promote behavioral change--the so-called "ABC" approach, relying on abstinence, marital fidelity ("be faithful"), and condoms--has failed to stem the tide of new HIV infections. According to the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), some four million people worldwide were newly infected in 2005. Even as antiretroviral therapy begins to trickle down to people in resource-limited countries, public health experts estimate that about four people become infected with HIV for each person who starts treatment.