By Anitah Ashemereirwe,
WORLD AIDS DAY
Uganda is among the 11 countries on the African continent that have granted regulatory approval through import permits for use of dapivirine vaginal ring (DVR) to help women reduce the risk of getting infected with HIV/AIDS.
The Population Council and IPM South Africa, an affiliate of the Population Council, announced that the ring is currently being offered to women in Southern and Eastern Africa states of Eswatini, Kenya, Lesotho, South Africa, Uganda and Zimbabwe .
According to the manufacturer, dapivirine ring is made of flexible silicone and slowly releases the antiretroviral drug dapivirine in the vagina for one month.
The ring is the first long-acting HIV prevention method designed for women and it is approved for use in women aged 18 and above.
Jim Sailer, the Council’s interim co-president and executive director of the Council’s Center for Biomedical Research the non-governmental organization spearheading the international rollout of the DVR Women bear the brunt of the HIV/AIDS epidemic said the innovation to enable ending HIV in the Sub-saharan Africa by 2030.
“The virus is one of the biggest threats to the health and well-being of women. In sub-Saharan Africa, one adolescent girl or young woman becomes infected with HIV every three minutes. We cannot achieve the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) of ending HIV by 2030 unless we curtail this epidemic in women. Women deserve multiple options to protect themselves against this lifelong disease” said Jim Sailer.
The World Health Organization (WHO) data shows that girls and young women ages 24 and younger in sub-Saharan Africa remain one of the most at-risk populations for HIV/AIDS, with infections three times those of similarly aged boys and young men in the region.
The senior director for strategy and commercial relations for the Council, Anitah Bhatia Garg said “Women need different choices for HIV prevention at different stages of their lives, and the ring could be a critically important option. It complements existing HIV prevention tools and circumvents well-documented challenges that adolescent girls and young women face in taking pills on a daily basis.”
The ring was developed to provide a long-acting prevention method for women when higher-efficacy products like daily oral PrEP are not viable options.
The Council has reached a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Kiara Health for a strategic partnership for the ring with the goal of reducing costs and increasing women’s access to the product.
Diantha Pillay, associate director for product access for the South African affiliate office, stated that because of economic disparities and uneven power dynamics within sexual partnerships, women and girls are often unable to negotiate safer sex or even choose when or with whom they have sex.
Such factors she said also drive gender-based violence, which further increases women’s risk of HIV infection.
“Therefore, there is a need for comprehensive prevention strategies that include options that women control” Pillay said.
Population Council is developing a longer duration dapivirine ring that women would use for three months versus one month to significantly lower annual costs and offer a woman a more convenient option to protect themselves
