Category Archives: Feature

The 2026 CHIPTS HIV Next Generation Conference welcomed over 150 attendees from academic institutions, community-based organizations, health care institutions, and other organizations working to end the HIV epidemic at the California Endowment on Thursday, February 5, 2026. The conference included engaging oral and poster presentations, lively discussions, and networking opportunities to support the next generation of HIV researchers and service providers.

CHIPTS Development Core Director, Jesse Clark, MD, MSc facilitated this year’s conference and provided a warm welcome to participants. CHIPTS Director, Raphael Landovitz, MD, MSc followed with opening remarks setting the tone for an exciting conference. He echoed the conference’s goals with a powerful statement: “Ask bold questions. Show us your unfinished ideas. Let this be a place where curiosity is encouraged and where support is tangible.”

Ashleigh Herrera, PhD, MSW, Assistant Professor, Department of Social Work at California State University Bakersfield offered an engaging and insightful opening plenary on “Resilience and Resistance: Building Community, Connection, and Protection to Preserve the HIV Continuum of Care and Research.” She emphasized the importance of multilevel social support—strategic guidance from senior mentors and collective care among early-career peers—in navigating challenges and sustaining momentum.

Throughout the day, there were four sets of oral presentations and in-between a fantastic group of poster presentations highlighting innovative research and evaluation projects to support efforts to end the HIV epidemic. Access poster presentations on our webpage.

The first panel was moderated by CHIPTS Development Core Co-Director Marjan Javanbakht, PhD and centered on structural access to HIV care and service delivery. The second set of oral presentations moderated by CHIPTS Combination Prevention Core Affiliate Michael Li, PhD, MPH focused on intersectionality (e.g., intimate partner violence, substance use, and stigma/discrimination). CHIPTS Combination Prevention Core Scientist Ronald Brooks, PhD moderated the third panel on keeping it local: HIV/STIs in Los Angeles. The fourth panel moderated by CHIPTS Development Core Director, Jesse Clark, MD, MSc was a unique conversation on moving research forward that provided tools, perspectives, and examples to foster resilience, innovation, and long-term career growth.

To close the conference, CHIPTS Co-Director Steve Shoptaw, PhD congratulated this year’s outstanding presenters and encouraged participants to continue their commitment to new ideas and collaborations as we work together to end the HIV epidemic.

A complete list of oral presentations with descriptions, slides, and photo highlights from the conference are provided below.

Check out our photo gallery on our Facebook page.

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Opening Plenary:

Ashleigh Herrera, PhD, MSW

Presentation Title: Resilience and Resistance: Building Community, Connection, and Protection to Preserve the HIV Continuum of Care and Research 

Presentation Summary: Drawing from a nontraditional pathway into biomedical HIV research grounded in clinical and community-based work, this presentation explores how mentorship, community-academic partnerships, and creative public, private, and nonprofit funding mechanisms can expand HIV prevention, testing, and care. I will highlight innovative delivery models, including health vending machines, alongside lessons learned from sustaining community-centered research during periods of uncertainty. The talk concludes by emphasizing the importance of multilevel social support—strategic guidance from senior mentors and collective care among early-career peers—in navigating challenges and sustaining momentum.

Oral Panel 1 – Structural Access to HIV Care and Service Delivery:

1. Arianna Lister, BS

Presentation Title: Emergency Department HIV PrEP: A Review of Attitudes, Feasibility, and Implementation Barriers

Presentation Summary:  This presentation reviews current evidence on patient and provider attitudes, feasibility, acceptability, and implementation barriers related to HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) delivery in emergency departments (EDs), which serve as key access points for populations at increased HIV risk, including unhoused people and people who use drugs (PWUD). The presentation highlights findings demonstrating that ED-based PrEP is feasible and acceptable when paired with patient-centered education, navigation, and care coordination, particularly through dedicated navigator or same-day initiation models. It concludes by discussing priorities for future research, including stigma reduction, low-barrier and equity-oriented strategies for implementation, and the impact of ED-initiated PrEP on adherence, retention, and HIV incidence.

2. Sona Oksuzyan, PhD, MD, MPH

Presentation Title: Medical Care Coordination Program in Los Angeles County: 10-year program evaluation, lessons learned, and future steps

Presentation Summary: This evaluation focuses on Medical Care Coordination (MCC) effectiveness in improving health outcomes, such as retention in care and viral suppression, using a quasi-experimental pre-and-post study design comparing health outcomes in 12 months before and after MCC enrollment from January 1, 2013, through December 31, 2022. Significant improvements
were observed in retention in care and viral suppression after 12 months of enrollment in MCC across all socio-demographic groups of MCC patients.

3. Beimnet Taye, MPH

Presentation Title: Transportation Vulnerability & HIV Care Engagement in Los Angeles County

Presentation Summary:  Neighborhood-level factors such as crime and public transportation access could all affect a person living with HIV’s ability and willingness to seek HIV care by impacting their ability to safely commute to and from clinics and pharmacies. Linking place of residence with both publicly available crime and public transport data from 2018-2022, this project provides an opportunity to explore how these factors are associated with individual HIV care engagement among a cohort of men who are living with HIV.

4. Amanda Wahnich, MPH

Presentation Title: Expanding HIV Prevention through Community Pharmacy-based PrEP and PEP Initiation in Los Angeles County, 2024-2025

Presentation Summary: The Los Angeles County PharmPrEP program leveraged California SB 159 to enable community pharmacies to initiate PrEP and PEP and expand HIV prevention access beyond traditional clinics. Across eight pharmacies, the program successfully reached priority populations to initiate new PrEP starts, demonstrated high client and staff satisfaction, and achieved linkage to ongoing medical care. The findings support community pharmacies as acceptable, feasible, and effective settings for equitable HIV testing and prevention initiation.

Oral Panel 2 – Intersectionality:

1. Sungsub Choo, PhD

Presentation Title: Relationship between intimate partner violence victimization and HIV treatment adherence among black sexual minority men with HIV: mediation through depression

Presentation Summary: Syndemic framework has been widely used to note the co-occurrence of intimate partner violence (IPV), depression, and engagement in HIV care among sexual minority men (SMM). We find that depressive symptoms fully mediated the association between past-year IPV victimization and future ART nonadherence, after controlling for past ART nonadherence. Our findings highlight a need for a trauma-informed approach for IPV survivors who are young Black SMM living with HIV, with specific emphasis on addressing depression among them to ensure improved treatment adherence.

2. Alexandra Mendoza-Graf, PhD

Presentation Title: Comparison of Intersectional Stigma Assessment Strategies for Black and Latino Gay, Bisexual, and Other Men Who Have Sex with Men

Presentation Summary: This presentation introduces new insights into measuring how overlapping experiences of racial and sexual orientation–based discrimination shape health and medical trust among Black and Latino gay and bisexual men. By comparing multiple methods for measuring intersectional stigma, the study found that a concise, intersectional scale performs nearly as well as longer, identity-specific measures—offering a reliable and efficient tool for research and community health efforts. The findings offer flexible strategies for capturing complex experiences of stigma and advancing more inclusive public health research.

3. Carrie L. Nacht, MPH

Presentation Title: When Isolation Meets Intoxication: The Relationship between Loneliness, Substance Use, and HIV Risk

Presentation Summary: This analysis explores how loneliness and substance use are related to different HIV risk outcomes, including PrEP use, STI incidence, condomless anal intercourse, transactional sex, sex while using drugs or alcohol, and number of sex partners. This longitudinal analysis is explored among a cohort of partnered sexual minority men in the United States with high prevalences of intimate partner violence and racial/ethnic minorities.

4. Dafna Paltin, MSc

Presentation Title: Multiple Discrimination and Resilience Among Racial and Sexual Minority Individuals with HIV

Presentation Summary: This presentation applies latent profile analysis (LPA) to characterize heterogeneous patterns of discrimination related to race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, and HIV status among adults living with HIV. These intersectional discrimination profiles are examined in relation to substance use, HIV clinical indicators, psychosocial factors, and demographic characteristics. Profiles differed significantly in demographic composition and experiences of discrimination; however, individuals demonstrated comparable substance use and HIV-related outcomes across profiles, underscoring resilience among racially and sexually minoritized individuals living with HIV. The presentation conceptualizes resilience as a dynamic, contextually embedded process and introduces a qualitative component of the project that explores how resilience is developed, sustained, and enacted in the context of intersecting structural and interpersonal adversity.

Oral Panel 3 – Keeping It Local: HIV/STIs in Los Angeles:

1. Paolo Gutierrez, BA and Abrahán Monzón, MS

Presentation Title: Centering TGI Voices in HIV Research: Strengths and Challenges of Data Collection Amid Housing Insecurity

Presentation Summary:  This presentation shares key lessons from the T.H3.E. Project on conducting community-driven HIV research with housing-insecure TGI women. Drawing from qualitative implementation data, it highlights strengths and challenges in data collection, including participant compensation, consent processes, community-rooted recruitment, and the impact of local political climates.

2. Bret Moulton, MPH and Daniel Yeung, PhD, MPH

Presentation Title: HIV acquisition Following Syphilis Diagnosis at HIV and STD Testing Sites in Los Angeles County, 2021-2024

Presentation Summary: HIV incidence among Los Angeles County (LAC) residents who accessed syphilis testing through the LAC Department of Public Health-supported HIV and STD testing programs was examined and compared to the timing of syphilis diagnoses. Cox proportional hazards models found that syphilis diagnosis was strongly associated with HIV acquisition after adjusting for demographic factors (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR] = 2.96; 95% CI: 2.42-3.62; p <0.0001). Individuals with syphilis had 196% higher risk of HIV acquisition compared to those without syphilis.

3. Martin Santillan, BA

Presentation Title: Community-informed development of a long-acting injectable PrEP awareness campaign for Latino men who have sex with men in LAC

Presentation Summary: Public health campaigns offer one strategy to increase awareness of HIV prevention options among at-risk populations. However, what is currently lacking in the literature is research on the development of a long-acting injectable PrEP campaign for disproportionately affected populations. Therefore, this study solicited community recommendations from LMSM for a campaign to raise awareness of LAI PrEP among this population in LAC.

4.  Jose Segura-Bermudez, BS

Presentation Title: Recommendations from Black MSM for Developing a Public Health Campaign to Promote Awareness of Long-Acting Injectable PrEP within their Community

Presentation Summary: This presentation is about how to design a public health campaign to increase awareness of long-acting injectable PrEP among Black men who have sex with men (BMSM) in Los Angeles County through community-driven recommendations. We conducted focus groups, which highlighted ideas about clear, factual messaging, authentic representation, trusted messengers, and careful visual choices to address stigma and medical mistrust among the BMSM community.

Oral Panel 4 – Moving Research Forward:

1. Mary Cambou, MD, PhD, Ashleigh Herrera, PhD, MSW, and Yang Wang, PhD

Presentation Title: Moving Research Forward

Presentation Summary: This panel will provide practical strategies for building and sustaining a successful research career in HIV, mental health, and substance use, including maintaining productivity and adapting career paths as opportunities evolve. It will highlight ways to diversify funding sources, such as foundations, philanthropy, and private partnerships. Participants will gain tools, perspectives, and examples to foster resilience, innovation, and long-term career growth despite financial and structural challenges.

This content originally appeared on grants.nih.gov. View the article here.

CHIPTS continues to use our website and social media accounts to disseminate the latest developments in HIV research, enriching learning opportunities, Center news, and more. As we near the end of the year, CHIPTS has taken the opportunity to reflect on the content we shared that sparked the most engagement from our community. We invite you to check out some of our most popular content from 2025 as we prepare to continue our collective work to end the HIV epidemic in 2026.

WEBSITE

In 2025, the CHIPTS website featured nearly 15 blog posts on the latest Center news as well as local, state, and national news from our research and public health partners. Our most popular blog topics included:

• World AIDS Day 2025 – A Message from Dr. Raphael Landovitz (Read here)
• 2025 CHIPTS Rapid Project Awardees (Read here)
• CDC Recommends New Injectable HIV PrEP (Read here)
• Updates to the NIH Public Access Policy in Effect (Read here)
• In Case You Missed It: Key Highlights from CROI 2025 (Read here)

The resource library housed on the CHIPTS website includes a wide range of downloadable materials to support HIV researchers and community partners, from assessment tools to research project reports to policy briefs. Check out our most popular downloads of 2025 below:

• CHIPTS 2026 HIV Next Generation Conference – Call for Abstracts (Download here)
• Innovative Interventions for Sustainable HIV/AIDS Epidemic Control in Zambia in a Quest to end the Pandemic in Africa by 2030 – Slides (Download here)
• HIV-Specific Antibody Responses After Early ART Initiation: Obstacles and Opportunities – Slides (Download here)
• 2026 CHIPTS Mentored Pilot Grant – Call for Applications (Download here)
• Developing and testing a multilevel intervention to promote viral suppression in the Dominican Republic – Slides (Download here)

SOCIAL MEDIA

CHIPTS continues to have an active presence across our social media platforms. In 2025, we shared relevant content with local, national, and global partners. Here is some of our most popular content posted on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube in 2025:

Twitter:  

Facebook:

• Check out our gallery capturing key moments from the 2025 CHIPTS HIV Next Generation Conference that took place at the California Endowment on January 31, 2025. (View here)
• Dr. Giang Le from Hanoi Medical University in Vietnam met with CHIPTS colleagues following #CPDD25 to discuss future research collaborations related to #HIV and substance use. (View here)
• Today is National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, a day to address the barriers to HIV/AIDS treatment for women and girls. In honor of #NWGHAAD, CAB Co-Chair Natalie Sanchez shares a reflection and highlights the Confessions: HIV+ Women Podcast. Read more: https://tinyurl.com/4up99jyc (View here)
• The UCLA-CDU CFAR and the UCLA AIDS Institute are accepting applications for their Pilot Projects designed for early-career investigators, Letters of Intent (LOIs) are being evaluated until deadline on Friday, September 12, 2025. Learn more: https://cfar.ucla-cdu.org/pilot-projects/ (View here)
• Accepting abstracts for #HIVNextGen, the submission deadline is on October 27, 2025, by 5PM PT. Abstracts that examine contextual factors influencing #HIV health outcomes are strongly encouraged. Learn more about submission guidelines and requirements: https://chipts.ucla.edu/hiv-next-generation-conference-4/ (View here)

YouTube:

• HIV-Specific Antibody Responses After Early ART Initiation: Obstacles and Opportunities (Watch here)
• Shaping the Future of HIV and HBV Therapeutics: Centering Socio-Behavioral Research (Watch here)
• Roll-out implementation optimization in Practice: Methodological Considerations and Case Examples (Watch here)
• The power and pitfalls of social media strategies: Lessons learned from implementation science efforts to end the HIV epidemic (Watch here)
• An Innovative intervention for Sustainable HIV/AIDS Epidemic control in Zambia (Watch here)

We look forward to bringing more relevant, engaging content to the CHIPTS community in 2026.

In observance of World AIDS Day on December 1, 2025, Center Director Dr. Raphael Landovitz shares a message of resilience and highlights the need for a bold response to help end the HIV epidemic. Read more below.

This World AIDS Day arrives at a moment of profound uncertainty. The global architecture that sustained HIV prevention and care for decades is shifting beneath us. The loss of PEPFAR and USAID funding, coupled with renewed threats to science and research itself, reminds us that progress—no matter how hard-won—is fragile. Yet, while these are unthinkable challenges, they are not unfamiliar ones. The HIV field has always thrived in adversity, forging paths where none were visible, insisting that evidence and empathy must coexist even when the world turns away.

At CHIPTS, we draw strength from that lineage of innovation and resistance. Our mission has never depended on comfort or consensus—it has endured through the conviction that science must be bold, inclusive, and unafraid. As support structures falter, our response cannot be retreat but reinvention: deeper collaboration across disciplines, new models of discovery, and research that continues to center the communities most affected. The times demand not only our intellect, but our imagination—our ability to create, to adapt, and to quietly subvert the forces that would diminish human dignity.

So today, we remember that hope is itself an act of defiance. In the words of Amanda Gorman, from “New Day’s Lyric”:

“For wherever we come together,
We will forever overcome.”

Raphael Landovitz, MD, MSc

CHIPTS Director

A spotlight featuring the three projects of our 2025 CHIPTS Rapid Projects awardees that includes project titles and project abstracts. Dr. Wei-Ti Chen tests a compassion-based intervention to reduce stigma and improve mental health. Dr. Huyen Pham uses evidence synthesis and machine learning to improve care for people with HIV and co-occurring mental health or substance use disorders. Beimnet Taye examines how transportation, crime, and neighborhood factors shape care access in Los Angeles. Together, they drive innovative strategies to strengthen engagement and outcomes for people living with HIV.

Project Title: The impact of a culturally adapted stigma-reduction intervention on mental health and care engagement

Awardee: Wei-Ti Chen, PhD

Project Abstract: This project evaluates the impact of a spiritually grounded, compassion-based intervention on mental health and HIV care engagement among adults living with HIV. The primary aim is to generate evidence to inform innovative, adaptable strategies for reducing stigma and improving outcomes among people living with HIV (PLWH) in the United States. HIV-related stigma—manifested as negative societal attitudes and internalized shame—remains a major barrier to mental health, social support, and treatment adherence, especially within marginalized communities. The intervention integrates mindfulness, nonattachment, and self-compassion, drawing from cognitive-behavioral frameworks and culturally-informed practices. Participants are randomized to an enhanced treatment group or a standard care group. The enhanced group receives four weekly, facilitator-led sessions focused on coping with stigma and building peer support. Outcomes assessed include depressive symptoms, anxiety, antiretroviral therapy adherence, and viral load. Mediators such as internalized stigma, self-compassion, and perceived social support are measured at multiple time points. Generalized Estimating Equations (GEE) will compare changes over time between groups, controlling for demographics and baseline stigma, and mediation analyses will test whether improvements in these mediators account for better mental health and care engagement.

Project Title: Integrating Predictive Modeling and Evidence Synthesis to Improve Care for Individuals with Co-occurring HIV, SUD, and MHD

Awardee: Huyen Pham, PhD

Project Abstract: People with HIV (PWH) often experience co-occurring mental health disorders (MHD) and substance use disorders (SUD), which negatively impact HIV treatment outcomes. Integrated care models are essential but remain poorly understood. This study has two aims: (1) to conduct a scoping review of integrated care models for individuals with HIV and co-occurring SUD/MHD, and (2) to use machine learning (ML) to predict SUD/MHD comorbidity, treatment utilization, and identify key drivers of treatment utilization among PWH, using 2010–2019 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) data. The first aim will follow Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for scoping review (PRISMAScR) framework, drawing from electronic databases and focusing on studies published between 2015 and 2024. Integrated care models will be characterized by setting, provider type, services offered, and evaluation metrics (e.g., accessibility, effectiveness, quality, cost). Additionally, patient characteristics associated with positive outcomes will be identified. For the second aim, the study will analyze data from 409,521 adult respondents from NSDUH data, including 702 individuals who self-reported an HIV diagnosis (representing a weighted estimate of 488,000 annually). Key drivers of SUD/MHD comorbidity and treatment utilization among individuals with HIV and co-occurring SUD and/or MHD will be identified. Findings from this project will improve understanding of integrated care strategies and inform healthcare policy to better address service needs and treatment engagement among individuals with comorbid HIV, SUD, and/or MHD.

Project Title: Transportation Vulnerability & HIV Care Engagement in Los Angeles County

Awardee: Beimnet Taye, MPH

Project Abstract: Although effective treatment and testing options exist for HIV care, people still face issues in fully utilizing these care options. External neighborhood level factors such as crime prevalence, public transportation access, and traffic congestion could all affect a person living with HIV’s ability and willingness to seek HIV care by impacting their ability to commute to and from HIV clinics and pharmacies. In Los Angeles County these factors vary significantly between neighborhoods. Thus, this project provides an opportunity to explore how these factors at the census tract level are associated with individual HIV care engagement and how these factors affecting residential mobility modify the association between individual behaviors such as frequency of substance use and care engagement among a cohort of men who are living with HIV (The mSTUDY). By linking publicly available crime and arrest data from the Los Angeles Sheriff and Police departments, Public transport stops density data, and daily average traffic data to the individual level cohort data by census tract of residence we can leverage hierarchal mixed models to quantify cross level associations and interactions with HIV related appointment adherence and viral suppression (≤ 200 copies/mL) among those living with HIV. Quantifying these relationships will not only identify important residential based issues facing this population in Los Angeles, but can also inform future specifically tailored interventions for this population that can attempt to ameliorate these issues and better HIV care engagement for all.

This content originally appeared on CDC.gov. View the article here.

Dear Colleague,

Today, CDC published new Clinical Recommendations for twice-a-year injectable lenacapavir as an additional option for HIV prevention in the United States. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved injectable lenacapavir, a prescribed medication, for HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) in June 2025. This is a significant step forward in expanding prevention options and reflects decades of research, partnership, and commitment to ending the HIV epidemic.

CDC has reviewed and graded the evidence on lenacapavir as PrEP from two clinical trials, which demonstrated strong efficacy in preventing HIV infection among both females and males and found no serious safety concerns. On the basis of a high certainty of evidence for its efficacy and safety derived from the agency’s analysis, CDC strongly recommends lenacapavir, administered every six months as a subcutaneous injection, for HIV PrEP in all people weighing at least 35 kg who would benefit.

The Clinical Recommendations for lenacapavir are an addition to CDC’s current Clinical Guidance for PrEP which also recommends daily oral pills or injectable cabotegravir, which is administered every two months. All FDA-approved PrEP options are highly effective in preventing HIV when taken as prescribed.

CDC recommends health care providers inform all sexually active adults and adolescents about proven options for PrEP and prescribe PrEP to anyone who requests it. The addition of lenacapavir provides another powerful option in HIV prevention. Because lenacapavir only needs to be administered every six months, it may help some people overcome challenges with adherence or more regular health care visits associated with other existing PrEP options.

This milestone would not have been possible without the tireless efforts of our partners — federal, academic, community-based, and clinical — who lead and help generate the evidence-based research and programs.

According to the most recent CDC estimates, more than 31,000 people acquire HIV in the United States each year. The FDA approved the first HIV PrEP in 2012, and PrEP has become a vital part of U.S. HIV prevention efforts. Combined with HIV testing and effective treatment, PrEP has contributed to significant reductions in new HIV infections. Reaching people with more options for PrEP, including lenacapavir, will further strengthen national efforts and accelerate progress toward ending the HIV epidemic.

CDC estimates 2.2 million Americans could benefit from PrEP and is currently working to update estimates of current PrEP coverage in the United States. Thank you for helping us raise the visibility of this new prevention option as we continue to work together to maximize the impact of all available strategies for preventing HIV.

Sincerely,
/Robyn Fanfair/
Robyn Neblett Fanfair, MD, MPH
Captain, USPHS
Director
Division of HIV Prevention
National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

This content originally appeared on UNAIDS.org. View the press release here.

GENEVA, 5 September 2025 – UNAIDS welcomes the announcement by the US State Department that the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) will be supporting an initiative by the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria to provide lenacapavir to up to 2 million people in countries with high burdens of HIV.

Lenacapavir, an American-based innovation, is one of the most promising new HIV prevention tools that has emerged in the HIV response, offering protection against HIV with just twice-yearly injections. The breakthrough medicine will save thousands of lives if made widely available for all people and populations at risk of HIV including young women and adolescent girls as well as sex workers, people who inject drugs, and men who have sex with men in high burden countries and geographies.

“This deal offers hope that many more people around the world who are at risk of HIV will have access to this revolutionary HIV medicine. More global work will be needed to increase scale and rapidly make lenacapavir available, affordable and accessible in all low and middle-income countries. But at this critical moment, the United States’ backing of this breakthrough medicine is an important signal to the world that by investing in the HIV response we can stop new infections,” said Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS.

An initial roll-out of 2 million is an important start toward a broader ambition and i t is important that lenacapavir be available to all people in need, not only to some. UNAIDS estimates that 20 million people will need to be reached with antiretroviral-based prevention such as lenacapavir as part of efforts to achieve the 2030 global HIV prevention targets. UNAIDS also estimates that for every US$ 1 invested in HIV prevention, US$ 7 will be saved in treatment and care costs later.

The price for lenacapavir in France, Norway, Spain and the United States in late 2024 exceeded US$ 28 000 per person per year. For this initiative, manufacturer Gilead has pledged to supply the medicine at no profit. Research published earlier this year showed that lenacapavir can be made and sold for just US$ 40 per person per year, falling to US$ 25 with sufficient scale.

To successfully expand access to lenacapavir, community engagement will be essential. To advance progress in the roll-out, populations most impacted by HIV must play a central role in its delivery and people most at risk of HIV must have access.

UNAIDS will continue to support countries and partners in driving the response to HIV forward to ensure that everyone, everywhere has access to the HIV services they need and that AIDS is ended as a public health threat by 2030.

This content originally appeared on Gilead.com. View the full article here.

Gilead Sciences, Inc. announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved Yeztugo (lenacapavir)—the company’s injectable HIV-1 capsid inhibitor—as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to reduce the risk of sexually acquired HIV in adults and adolescents weighing at least 35kg, making it the first and only twice-yearly option available in the United States for people who need or want PrEP. Data show that ≥99.9% of participants who received Yeztugo in the Phase 3 PURPOSE 1 and PURPOSE 2 trials remained HIV negative.

“This is a historic day in the decades-long fight against HIV. Yeztugo is one of the most important scientific breakthroughs of our time and offers a very real opportunity to help end the HIV epidemic,” said Daniel O’Day, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Gilead Sciences. “This is a medicine that only needs to be given twice a year and has shown remarkable outcomes in clinical studies, which means it could transform HIV prevention. Gilead scientists have made it their life’s work to end HIV and now, with the FDA approval of Yeztugo and in collaboration with our many partners, we can help to make that goal a reality.”

The first PrEP medication, which was also developed by Gilead, was approved in the U.S. in 2012. However, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show that, in 2022 (the most recent year with available data), only about 1 in 3 (36%) people in the U.S. who met the CDC’s eligibility criteria for PrEP were prescribed a form of PrEP. CDC data show that all populations in the U.S. are not yet using PrEP at rates that could end transmission of the virus at the population level, with particular gaps for women, Black/African American and Hispanic/Latino people, and people in the U.S. South. Data also show that barriers including adherence challenges, stigma and low awareness of existing PrEP options—by both healthcare providers and consumers—contribute to this low uptake of PrEP across multiple populations. The potential impact of this limited uptake, adherence and access is underscored by the fact that, in 2023, more than 100 people were diagnosed with HIV every day in the U.S.

“Yeztugo could be the transformative PrEP option we’ve been waiting for—offering the potential to boost PrEP uptake and persistence and adding a powerful new tool in our mission to end the HIV epidemic,” said Carlos del Rio, MD, Distinguished Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Emory University School of Medicine and Co-Director of the Emory Center for AIDS Research in Atlanta. “A twice-yearly injection could greatly address key barriers like adherence and stigma, which individuals on more frequent PrEP dosing regimens, especially daily oral PrEP, can face. We also know that, in research, many people who need or want PrEP preferred less frequent dosing.”

Access the full article on the Gilead Sciences, Inc website: Yeztugo Lenacapavir Is Now the First and Only FDA Approved HIV Prevention Option Offering 6 Months of Protection

This content originally appeared on NIH Office of Science Policy. View the full article here.

Increasing access to publications resulting from federally funded research offers many benefits to the scientific community and the public. Access can accelerate research, generate higher quality scientific results, encourage greater scientific integrity, and enable future inquiry, discovery, and translation for NIH-supported research. Importantly, these efforts also uphold NIH’s commitment to responsible stewardship of the Nation’s investment in biomedical research by improving transparency and accessibility of taxpayer-funded research.

The NIH Public Access Policy (NOT-OD-25-047) is now in effect as of July 1, 2025.

The Policy will continue to apply to any author accepted manuscript accepted for publication in a journal that is the result of funding by NIH in whole or in part through a grant or cooperative agreement, including training grants, a contract, an other transaction, NIH intramural research, or the official work of an NIH employee. Author accepted manuscripts meeting this qualification and with acceptance dates on or after July 1, 2025, are subject to the Policy.

Read more on the NIH website: https://sharing.nih.gov/public-access-policy/.

On May 19, 2025 – CHIPTS will join partners across the U.S. in observing National Asian & Pacific Islander HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, a day to raise awareness and promote action against HIV and AIDS within Asian and Pacific Islander (API) communities. It also emphasizes the importance of education, quality care, and addressing stigma and related health conditions.

NAPIHAAD is an important reminder of the ongoing efforts to promote HIV prevention, testing, and treatment among Asian, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander people and an opportunity to share important resources that can help combat the HIV epidemic. Please use the resources below to support the ongoing efforts to reduce HIV and AIDS in this community.

• The CDC’s Let’s Stop HIV Together (Together) campaign offers resources about testing and treatment for Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and other Pacific Islanders. The campaign also provides messaging to use for NAPIHAAD to help spark conversations about HIV and to reduce HIV stigma in Asian and Pacific Islander communities.
• Join the conversation on social media with the hashtag #APIMay19 and follow @HIV.gov. Visit the National Asian & Pacific Islander HIV/AIDS Awareness Day page and use gov’s basics information to share HIV facts, raise awareness, and find details about HIV testing, stigma, and its effects.

As an AIDS Research Center committed to investigating and addressing HIV and related challenges, CHIPTS is pleased to share recent research by Dr. Wei-Ti Chen, CP Core Affiliate, which specifically explores and addresses these barriers within Asian communities.

Huang, J., Lin, Y., Fu, Y., Xu, Z., Hong, H., Arbing, R., Chen, W. T., Wang, A., & Huang, F. (2024). A longitudinal network analysis of interaction factors among Chinese women at high risk for perinatal depression. Midwifery, 139, 104187.

Chen, W. T., Sun, W., Huang, F., Shiu, C. S., Kim, B., Candelario, J., Toma, L., Wu, G., & Ah-Yune, J. (2024). Lost in Translation: Impact of Language Barriers and Facilitators on the Health Care of Asian Americans Living with HIV. Journal of racial and ethnic health disparities, 11(4), 2064–2072.

Chen, W. T., & Barbour, R. (2023). Male and female Asians living with HIV: a text-mining analysis comparing their concerns. Frontiers in psychology, 14, 1114731.