A Gel That Puts HIV Prevention in Women's Hands

It's odorless, colorless and it comes in a demure plastic applicator. And according to a team of husband-and-wife researchers based in South Africa, it could revolutionize the way HIV/AIDS is fought around the world.

The product is a gel — a microbicide — that's also earned itself the moniker of "molecular condom." In new trials performed by the Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research, women who applied the gel decreased their risk of HIV infection by an average of 39%. Among women who used the gel most consistently, the risk was diminished by as much as 54%. Especially given how in Africa — home to the bulk of the world's HIV cases — young women infected by older men are the most vulnerable to the disease, scientists and policymakers around the world are hailing this latest discovery as a major breakthrough.

"Boy, have we been doing the happy dance," says Dr. Salim Abdool Karim, of Durban's University of KwaZulu-Natal, one of the trials's key researchers.

Activists have long hoped for the development of a product that would give women the ability to protect themselves from the disease. Unlike male condoms, which require a partner's consent, women can use microbicides without being detected. In fact, among women who participated in this latest trial, fully one-third said their partners had no idea.

In an unexpected but appreciated side effect, it turns out that the gel — which contains a 1% drug concentration — also cuts a woman's risk of genital herpes by 51%. That's particularly important, because women with herpes have double the risk of getting HIV.

The trial focused on 889 women in Durban, as well as in a remote rural village. Half of the women were given a placebo, while the other half used the gel before and after sex. Most women used the product as directed — a promising sign for its potential real-world application.

And though Karim doesn't know how much each dose will ultimately cost, he does note that the applicators and gel cost just pennies.

This latest news, announced at this year's international AIDS conference in Vienna, comes on the heels of 15 years of failed microbicide trials that have shown no effect, or negative effects, on transmission rates. There's still a great deal of research that's needed, but in the meantime, as UNAIDS director Michel Sidibe says, by putting women firmly in the driver's seat, the gel has all the hallmarks of a possible "powerful option for the prevention revolution."

Photo Credit: euthman