HIV and HCV: distinct infections with important overlapping challenges

• Published in: Journal of the International AIDS Society Vol. 17; no. 1; pp. 19323 - n/a
• Main Authors: Wiktor, Stefan, Ford, Nathan, Ball, Andrew, Hirnschall, Gottfried
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland International AIDS Society 01-01-2014; John Wiley & Sons, Inc; Wiley
• Subjects: Acquired immune deficiency syndrome; AIDS; Civil society; Coinfection - drug therapy; Coinfection - epidemiology; Communicable Disease Control - methods; Complications and side effects; Development and progression; Drugs; Genetic aspects; Health aspects; Health Services Accessibility; Hepatitis C; Hepatitis C, Chronic - complications; Hepatitis C, Chronic - drug therapy; Hepatitis C, Chronic - epidemiology; Hepatitis C, Chronic - prevention & control; HIV; HIV infections; HIV Infections - complications; HIV Infections - drug therapy; HIV Infections - epidemiology; HIV Infections - prevention & control; Human immunodeficiency virus; Humans; Infections; Infectious diseases; International organizations; Medical screening; Pharmaceutical industry; Prevention; Risk factors; Sex industry; Stigma; Viewpoint; Africa
• ISSN: 1758-2652; 1758-2652
• DOI: 10.7448/IAS.17.1.19323

After decades of poor treatment outcomes using drugs discovered over 40 years ago (ribavirin [ 4] and interferon [ 5]), a robust drug development pipeline has begun to deliver a number of safe and highly effective treatments; however, the cost of these drugs is currently too high to allow for widespread treatment scale‐up, even in high‐income settings [ 6]. Scaling up prevention alongside treatment Common routes of HCV transmission include injecting drug use, unsafe medical injections and other invasive procedures, contaminated blood products, and less common routes of transmission include mother‐to‐child transmission, sexual transmission (particularly among HIV‐positive individuals), and non‐sterile tattoo or piercing procedures. Improving access to key prevention interventions is in many countries limited by weak blood safety and infection control systems and policies that restrict access to sterile equipment for drug injecting, tattooing and skin piercing, notably in closed settings such as prisons, along with suboptimal availability of condoms, particularly for sex workers and their clients and men who have sex with men.