UNAIDS Executive Director Winnie Byanyima welcomes long-acting HIV treatment

Responding to the news last week that the European Commission had approved an HIV treatment option that patients can only take twice a year, Byanyima said that this could enable more people to get on treatment.

"It is great news that a range of long-acting HIV treatment options are set to come on stream. A range of options for long-acting treatments, received every few months, could enable more people to get on treatment or offer better clinical options for patients showing resistance to current regimens, therefore staying longer on treatment, and prevent many AIDS-related deaths – if they become available for all who need them," Byanyima said.

UNAIDS states on it's website that progress in long-acting treatments follows progress in long acting prevention.

Byanyima added that monopoly production of such treatments cannot ensure global availability and affordability, arguing that worldwide availability of affordable long-acting treatments would require the transfer of technology to enable generic production.

UNAIDS appreciated the recent decision by ViiV (an independent, global specialist HIV company) to share its long-acting HIV prevention technology to enable generic production. The global body welcomed the decision and is urging an expansion of the number of countries included.

Currently, many upper middle-income countries do not have access to these technologies, according to UNAIDS. Achieving global targets to end AIDS would require countries around the world to have access to newer technologies, a matter that Byanyima is currently advocating.

"Delays in the transfer of technology of innovative health products cost lives. The process of sharing of long-acting treatment technology, of the intellectual property rights and “recipes”, should not wait for after long-acting HIV treatment medicines are made available to people in rich countries," she says.

Her argument is that the process should begin at the early stages of the Research and Development (R&D) cycle.