this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2024
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Twice-yearly shots used to treat AIDS were 100% effective in preventing new infections in women, according to study results published Wednesday.

There were no infections in the young women and girls that got the shots in a study of about 5,000 in South Africa and Uganda, researchers reported. In a group given daily prevention pills, roughly 2% ended up catching HIV from infected sex partners.

“To see this level of protection is stunning,” said Salim Abdool Karim of the injections. He is director of an AIDS research center in Durban, South Africa, who was not part of the research.

The results in women were published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine and discussed at an AIDS conference in Munich. Gilead paid for the study and some of the researchers are company employees. Because of the surprisingly encouraging results, the study was stopped early and all participants were offered the shots, also known as lenacapavir.

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[–] [email protected] 93 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Amazing. Hopefully this leads to eradicating HIV for good.

[–] [email protected] 46 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Have you seen gestures broadly?

[–] [email protected] 44 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah, I'm getting jaded as I get older. The optimist in me recognizes how ground breaking this is, and thinks there's a real possibility of actually eradicating AIDS. The pessimist in me remembers covid.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

if PrEP had been invented 25 years ago it would be banned

we've come a long way

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Haha, nicely put

[–] [email protected] -4 points 1 month ago (2 children)

If there's profit to be made treating HIV/AIDS symptoms without curing, the profit motive health industry won't like this. Solve the problem, their profits go away.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I mean why do we eradicate any diseases if there is profit involved?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (2 children)

We can speculate very easily.

There's a trade-off, cost-benefit analysys. If a disease is so catastrophic that it kills everyone fast, well you're not gonna make profit off them ever, because they die. Cure this one.

What about diseases that can be controlled somewhat, and only affect small amounts of the population? What if for them to stay alive they have to stay on a regular concoction of expensive pharmaceuticals either forever or for a long time? And they can still go to work? Why cure this, out of altruism? That's not how capitalism works.

Let's just say, for shits and giggles, we could cure immediately the common cold and mild influenza, forever. No more cough and cold over the counter medicine needed, much less pain and fever reducers. Local pharmacies don't need to stock this stuff anymore. The companies that produce and sell these are all tied to wallstreet. Getting colds doesn't stop you from working (or buying/consuming). Shit, I work with "men" who are "tough" who never call out of work sick because "I'm not a pussy" (cultural hardwork ethic propaganda nonsense).

Etc., etc. You get my point.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

I'm not sure why you're being downvoted.

Correct me if I'm wrong but you're not saying this is a good thing. Just that it is a thing.

Makes sense to me. But I concede that I'm ignorant of what diseases we have cured recently, and too tired to research it right now.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

Yellow fever, cholera, mumps, polio, measles, and malaria were endemic in the US prior to their eradication. By "endemic" I mean children got them as often as chicken pox. They were almost unavoidable and killed millions.

Measles and mumps are making a comeback due to anti-vax losers, but the others are still gone.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

The downvotes are meh, I've made similar comments that got more upvoted. Lemmy is a fickle beast and probably depends on the crowd at the time and their mood or the article or whatever.

You're correct, I was not saying this is good by any means. I want the profit motive removed from everything healthcare related. I was just giving an exaggerated simple example of how the capitalist profit motive could (and arguably does) work in some instances.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 month ago

expensive pharmaceuticals

antiretroviral meds are getting very cheap though, so not sure if that is really a valid point anymore. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cost_of_HIV_treatment

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

Then some other company will do it. Not all world is US and A. Is some areas like Europe the states would be more than happy to order those vaccines to treat their citizens. There’s demand made by public health organizations, there will be someone willing to join the race and eat that cake.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Please make this affordable in the U.S.

I have a feeling it won't be.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 month ago (1 children)

But then people might have sex without fear! That's bound to make baby Jesus cry!

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago

40k per dose

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 month ago
[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

Republicans will work tirelessly to ban this in the U.S.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 month ago (7 children)

twice-yearly

I wonder why they went with that, instead of saying bi-annually

[–] [email protected] 49 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

Is biannual twice yearly or every two years?

If you look it up, it’s both. IMO all these words are useless. Biweekly, bimonthly, etc.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Instead of biweekly I specify fortnightly. Is there a bimonthly equivalent? Fortweekly?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

We should make it a thing. Let's regroup in a fortweek and see how we're getting on.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

It's a date.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

If you use the word fortnight, it's likely you aren't from North America.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

I am American, but I won't use biweekly because it is ambiguous.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

I think it's trended to mean every 2. The original commentator wants chaos.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago

Bi-annually has the problem that it can mean twice a year or every two years.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Yes. A bicycle has two wheels, a semicircle is half a circle. Biannual is two years, semiannual is half a year.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

English isn't prescriptive, if enough people use it the wrong way then it becomes the right way.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

Tell that to the prescriptivists.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

It is clearer. What I learned at work is to write documents in high school language so that everyone can understand them.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

For research studies you are unironically required to write consent forms so a middle schooler can understand them because that’s the average level of comprehension in the USA

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

Does bisexual mean twice per sexual or once every two sexual?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

They could have gone with "every six months" too. I think any of them work, although as other say biannually can mean every two years as well, leading to confusion.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Bi has trended to mean every 2 weeks/months/years/etc.