Treatment as Prevention (TasP) refers to taking HIV medicine to prevent the sexual transmission of HIV. It is one of the most highly effective options for preventing HIV transmission.
Full Answer
What does prevention is better than cure mean?
- I don't know the origin of the phrase, and on-line dictionaries aren't much help either. ...
- At first, it was used in the sense of "good for you" (British: "good on you") or other encouraging words when one person stated their actions or goals to another.
- When I've heard it in recent years, the usage is more one of "Do what you like. ...
What are the principles of treatment and Prevention?
What are the Principles of Treatment and Prevention. Principles of Treatment There are to ways to treat an infectious (communicable) disease.These are – To reduce the effects of the disease: It can be done by providing symptomatic treatment. We can provide treatment that will reduce the symptoms which are usually because of inflammation.
Is treatment the same thing as prevention?
Treatment as prevention is a new potential approach to help curb the growth of the HIV epidemic. If we take a step back, away from the science and all the questions about whether and how much it will work -- bringing more people into care is essential regardless of any prevention benefit.
Is prevention the best treatment?
Prevention is the best treatment and it costs less in lives and dollars. Are you or a loved one struggling with addiction? Call us at 541.504.9577. Substance Abuse Prevention. BestCare Prevention uses all six of the Prevention Strategies listed by the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, which include:
Is PrEP treatment as prevention?
Pre-exposure prophylaxis (or PrEP) is medicine taken to prevent getting HIV. PrEP is highly effective for preventing HIV when taken as prescribed. PrEP reduces the risk of getting HIV from sex by about 99%. PrEP reduces the risk of getting HIV from injection drug use by at least 74%.
What does it mean when viral load is undetectable?
What does it mean to be undetectable? HIV medication (antiretroviral treatment, or ART) works by reducing the amount of the virus in the blood to undetectable levels. This means the levels of HIV are so low that the virus cannot be passed on. This is called having an undetectable viral load or being undetectable.
How do you know if your viral load is undetectable?
A person's viral load is considered “durably undetectable” when all viral load test results are undetectable for at least six months after their first undetectable test result. This means that most people will need to be on treatment for 7 to 12 months to have a durably undetectable viral load.
What does UU mean?
U=U means that people with HIV who achieve and maintain an undetectable viral load—the amount of HIV in the blood—by taking antiretroviral therapy (ART) daily as prescribed cannot sexually transmit the virus to others. Thus, treatment for HIV is a powerful arrow in the quiver of HIV prevention tools.
Is Undetectable the same as negative?
Being HIV positive and having an undetectable viral load would be considered the same thing as being HIV negative. Instead, we would frown upon those who don't know their status. Being HIV positive and having an undetectable viral load would be accepted, especially within the gay community.
What does NN emoji mean?
"No Name" is the most common definition for NN on Snapchat, WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Is Untransmittable a word?
UNTRANSMITTABLE (adjective) definition and synonyms | Macmillan Dictionary.
When was the statement on ART as prevention?
Statement on ART as Prevention. In October 2009, international HIV/AIDS advocacy organizations wrote a statement directed at participants of an upcoming treatment as prevention Consultation hosted by the World Health Organization that was held in November.
How does combination prevention work?
This approach utilizes a strategic combination of HIV prevention approaches to try to ensure that everyone in need has access to prevention messaging and programming when they need it. This means that program planners, with the knowledge of their communities, determine the best-case mix of programming to ensure that the fewest number of people fall through the holes in the safety net they have created by layering many different types of prevention programs.
Why is community based HIV prevention important?
Therefore, the community has an important role to play in ensuring that the human rights of people at risk for or living with HIV are safeguarded independent of the potential public health benefits of this approach .
How can HIV be reduced in a mother?
1 Treating the expectant mother with antiretroviral therapy reduce s the mother's viral load, thus potentially reducing the risk of transmission because the fetus is exposed to less virus in utero and during birth. However, the fetus also receives antiretroviral therapy while in the womb (as antiviral drugs penetrate the placenta) and the child may also receive antiviral drugs post birth. These forms of pre- and post-exposure prophylaxis may also play a role in the reduction of vertical transmission from mother to child.
Does antiretroviral therapy reduce the risk of sexual transmission?
The success of reducing the risk of mother-to-child transmission through the use of antiretroviral treatment provides proof of concept ( not concrete evidence) that antiretroviral therapy may be able to reduce the risk of sexual transmission.
Can a fetus receive antiretroviral therapy?
However, the fetus also receives antiretroviral therapy while in the womb (as antiviral drugs penetrate the placenta) and the child may also receive antiviral drugs post birth. These forms of pre- and post-exposure prophylaxis may also play a role in the reduction of vertical transmission from mother to child.
Does treatment eliminate virus?
For many people this reduction in the amount of virus may reduce infectivity (their ability to transmit the virus). However, we also know that treatment does not eliminate the virus from the body which means that the risk of transmission from one person to another is only potentially reduced and not eliminated.
How does treatment as prevention work?
Treatment as prevention has been used as a form of controlling the spread of HIV since the mid-1990s, initially in the context of preventing the transmission of the virus from mothers to their children. Research in 1994 revealed how the drug zidovudine can reduce vertical transmission. The testing and treatment of HIV-positive mothers during pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding has since led to the reduction of the risk of transmission by up to 95%. A program for offering ARVs for life to any HIV-positive pregnant person called "Option B+" served as a precursor to the "test and treat" strategy that is now being rolled out in various countries. Assessments of the Option B+ program are able to aid in the improvement and further establishment of "test and treat".
What is ART therapy?
In relation to HIV, antiretroviral therapy (ART) is a three or more drug combination therapy that is used to decrease the viral load, or the measured amount of virus, in an infected individual. Such medications are used as a preventative for infected individuals to not only spread the HIV virus to their negative partners ...
What is the TasP recommendation?
TasP's legitimacy has influenced the World Health Organization's (WHO) 2015 shift from "test and wait" to " test and treat" recommendation, which push to alert as many people as possible of their HIV status through testing, and start people infected with HIV on ARVs, no matter their viral load or CD4 count.
What are the challenges of scaling access to treatment?
Challenges to scaling access to treatment include cost and drug resistance. However, modeling studies suggest that the costs of not providing access would be far greater and concerns regarding resistance have not been borne out despite tens of millions of people accessing treatment.
Why is the use of ARVs feared?
The widespread global use of ARVs is feared to lead to an increase in drug resistance as a result of interrupted treatment and a lack of adherence. Despite these fears widespread resistance threatening the efficacy of ART has not emerged despite tens of millions of people being on treatment in the harshest conditions.
Why are people not seeing the benefits of ARV?
Many of the most vulnerable populations may not be seeing these benefits as a result of a social and political climate that is deterrent to seeking testing and treatment, in addition to making it difficult to stick with the ARV regimen.
Can HIV-1 be prevented?
The study's purpose was to reveal that HIV-1 viral transmission can be prevented through treatment, leading many regions to incorporate a treatment as prevention plan into their public health policy for responding to HIV.
What is HIV medicine?
HIV medicine is called antiretroviral therapy, or ART. If taken as prescribed, HIV medicine reduces the amount of HIV in the body ( viral load) to a very low level, which keeps the immune system working and prevents illness.
How does HIV help you stay healthy?
Getting and keeping an undetectable viral load * is the best thing people with HIV can do to stay healthy. Another benefit of reducing the amount of virus in the body is that it helps prevent transmission to others through sex or syringe sharing, and from mother to child during pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding.
What is preventive medicine?
Preventive medicine is an important field of medicine.
Why is preventive medicine important?
Preventive medicine is an important field of medicine. It not only keeps patients and communities healthy, but it also helps keeps health costs down. All doctors incorporate some degree of preventive medicine into their practice. But primary care physicians are especially good at helping their patients stay healthy.
Why is prevention important?
What Is Prevention and Why Is it Important? With respect to human services, prevention typically consists of methods or activities that seek to reduce or deter specific or predictable problems, protect the current state of well-being, or promote desired outcomes or behaviors. What is child abuse prevention?
What is prevention in child abuse?
The term "prevention" is typically used to represent activities that stop an action or behavior. It can also be used to represent activities that promote a positive action or behavior. Research has found that successful child abuse interventions must both reduce risk factors and promote protective factors to ensure the well-being ...
Why is prevention important in child abuse?
Psychology Today (2017) Examines child abuse and neglect and why prevention of child maltreatment is important because it can be avoided and because abuse and neglect can lead to negative consequences such as depression, developmental delays, and risk of developing substance abuse ...
prevention
the keeping of something (such as an illness or injury) from happening.
prevention
Action so as to avoid, forestall, or circumvent a happening, conclusion, or phenomenon (for example, disease prevention).
osteopathy
A school of medicine practiced predominantly in the US, and based on Dr Andrew Taylor Still's theory of healing, first delineated in 1874; osteopathic theory holds that a body in a state of wellness is correctly adjusted, and that disease represents a loss of coherency of structure and/or function, and the inability to mount a normal defense against infection, malignancy, inflammation, toxins and other inciting agents.
Patient discussion about prevention
Q. Is there something I could do in order to prevent headaches? I have headaches often and somebody told me that there're steps to be taken in order to prevent headaches so often... Please help...
prevention is better than cure
It is better to stop something bad from happening than it is to deal with it after it has happened.
Examples of prevention is better than cure
Secondly, the importance of prevention, as prevention is better than cure.
What Is Treatment as Prevention?
- We know that treatment for HIV can effectively reduce the amount of virus in the blood of someone living with HIV (often to levels that cannot be detected by current viral load tests). For many people this reduction in the amount of virus may reduce infectivity (their ability to transmit the virus). However, we also know that treatment does not eli...
How Do We Know If Treatment as Prevention Will Work?
- We don't really know for certain if treatment of a large group of people and the resulting reduction in average viral load will result in a meaningful and reliable reduction in HIV transmission. However, four types of evidence suggest that it might work at a population level: 1. studies on mother-to-child (vertical) transmission; 2. studies of serodiscordant couples; 3. ecological studi…
Why Doesn't Treatment as Prevention Work on An Individual level?
- "Viral load" is a measure of the amount of the virus in the body of someone living with HIV. When someone is successfully treated for HIV with HAART, the blood viral load test reads as "undetectable." However, this does not mean that the virus is not present; rather, the level of virus in the blood is very low -- too low for the test to find it. However, since there is still virus in the bo…
What Are The Main Components of A "Treatment as Prevention" Program?
- Increasing the Number of People Who Know They Are HIV-Positive
In Canada, it is estimated that 26% of people living with HIV don't know they have HIV.22This means that approximately 16,900 people in Canada are unaware they have HIV because they haven't been tested (or tested recently enough to know they are now HIV-positive). Increasing th… - Increasing the Number of People With HIV Receiving Treatment
In order for treatment as prevention to work we need to increase the number of people on treatment. This can be done by increasing the number of people who access care and treatment and increasing the number of people who are clinically eligible for HAART.
What Does This Approach Mean For Community-Based Agencies?
- Community-based AIDS service organizations (ASOs) in Canada have been at the forefront of HIV prevention since HIV emerged in our communities. The work that has been done has been integral to prevention efforts in Canada. With the advent of potential new approaches to HIV prevention, such as treatment as prevention, there may be exciting changes to community-based programm…
Impact on Services
- In addition to programming aimed at increasing testing and treatment, community agencies may have additional demands on them for other services. As discussed, research has found that some marginalized people are not currently accessing treatment. However, many of these people are not well positioned to start treatment due to competing priorities in their life, such as poverty, dr…
Funding
- The cost of increasing the number of people on therapy could have a large financial impact. There is some concern that this increasing cost could lead to prevention dollars being diverted to finance treatment costs (since treatment is now seen as a form of prevention). The community must fight to ensure that funding agencies do not divert dollars in this manner. It should be note…
What Is Happening on The Ground?
- In April 2009 at the Canadian Association of HIV Researchers (CAHR) conference in Vancouver, Gordon Campbell, the premier of B.C., announced that his government was committed to implementing several pilot projects in the province to test programming that will bring more people into treatment. This announcement followed more than a year of meetings between the …
to Wrap Up ...
- Treatment as prevention is a new potential approach to help curb the growth of the HIV epidemic. If we take a step back, away from the science and all the questions about whether and how much it will work -- bringing more people into care is essential regardless of any prevention benefit. Despite access to care and treatment in Canada, people are being diagnosed with HIV infection l…
References
- Volmink J, Siegfried N, van der Merwe L, Brocklehurst P. Antiretrovirals for reducing the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV infection. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews2006, Issue 4...
- Attia S, Egger M, Muller M, Zwahlen M, Low N. Sexual transmission of HIV according to viral load and antiretroviral therapy: Systematic review and meta-analysis. AIDS. 2009. 23:1397-14…
- Volmink J, Siegfried N, van der Merwe L, Brocklehurst P. Antiretrovirals for reducing the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV infection. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews2006, Issue 4...
- Attia S, Egger M, Muller M, Zwahlen M, Low N. Sexual transmission of HIV according to viral load and antiretroviral therapy: Systematic review and meta-analysis. AIDS. 2009. 23:1397-1404.
- Fang CT, Jsu HM, Twu SJ, et al. Decreased HIV transmission after a policy of providing free access to highly active antiretroviral therapy in Taiwan. Journal of Infectious Diseases. 2004.190:879-885
Overview
Treatment as prevention (TasP) is a concept in public health that promotes treatment as a way to prevent and reduce the likelihood of HIV illness, death and transmission from an infected individual to others. Expanding access to earlier HIV diagnosis and treatment as a means to address the global epidemic by preventing illness, death and transmission was first proposed in 2000 by Garnett et al. The term is often used to talk about treating people that are currently living with hu…
HIV Prevention Trials Network clinical trial 052
Early work by Quinn in Uganda demonstrated that transmission was reduced by over 90% when people living with HIV were on treatment and virally suppressed. Observational evidence accumulated and the Attia metaanalysis supported the 2008 Swiss Statement that said that those suppressed on treatment had little or no chance of transmission. Many experts, citing the Bradford Hill criteria, accepted this observational data. However, others called for randomized c…
Implementation
Treatment as prevention has been used as a form of controlling the spread of HIV since the mid-1990s, initially in the context of preventing the transmission of the virus from mothers to their children. Research in 1994 revealed how the drug zidovudine can reduce vertical transmission. The testing and treatment of HIV-positive mothers during pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding has since led to the reduction of the risk of transmission by up to 95%. A program for offering A…
Challenges and risks associated with Treatment as Prevention
While TasP has a huge potential to prevent the further spread of HIV worldwide, the major barrier to implementing TasP is lack of political will. Specifically, estimates suggest that only around 60% of all resources for HIV go towards ensuring diagnosis and treatment while the rest is spent on other priorities. In some African countries multiple billions of dollars have been allocated with some only achieving 60-70% ART coverage. Global HIV control priorities often include 90-90-90 …
Short-term and long-term solutions
In 2002, The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (Global Fund) was a financial initiative developed to raise and provide funding to the developing world in an attempt to enhance their care and treatment programs for individuals who are living with HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria. For the international organization to be successful, developed countries must work in conjunction with third-world countries, private organizations, civil society and afflicted communities to ease t…
Moving forward
Treatment as prevention has the ability to shift the paradigm of how HIV is received and treated. The effects of universal testing and treatment, and connecting people with resources for care will allow for global effects in terms of reduced rates of new HIV infections. The success of TasP is contingent upon innovation in strategies to increase the rate of HIV testing, along with exploring other dimensions of improving adherence, such as including cognitive and emotional support in …