“2020 could be a dark year for HIV prevention and treatment”

Grandstand. The crisis linked to the Covid-19 pandemic has mobilized and continues to mobilize massive efforts to take care of the sick, detect, reduce the risk of contagion and adapt our lifestyles. Many operations have had to be postponed and the monitoring of other diseases and infections is made difficult, on the one hand by the saturation of the hospitals, but also by the obvious displacement effect caused by the crisis.

Some patients give up treatment, for fear of cluttering the health system with other diseases, but also for fear of contracting the Covid virus. This can be especially true for people with HIV.

Covid therefore has a very negative impact on the HIV epidemic, and this is only the beginning if no measures are taken. The accessibility of prevention tools and the level of screening have decreased significantly. During the first hospitalization, the French Society for the Fight against AIDS observed a very sharp decline in the number of tests: 647,000 tests were not carried out compared to forecasts, equal to almost 10% of the annual volume.

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For the provision of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), a still too little known treatment that is taken before sexual intercourse and allows you to protect yourself from HIV contamination, the observation is the same, with a decrease of 47% during the period of imprisonment, which continued during the decline. 2020 could therefore be a black year for HIV prevention and treatment, even if the evolution of the curves in recent years has given us hope.

The Ile-de-France region, whose elected officials voted for the Ile-de-France plan against AIDS, has the responsibility to hammer home this message: there can be no double penalty, the Covid-19 crisis does not may not be associated with a decline in HIV prevention. It’s urgent. We ask that the “Labo sans ordo” device be generalized throughout the Ile-de-France, starting from 2021, which allows HIV tests to be performed without an appointment and without a prescription in laboratories, and which has proven its effectiveness. .

We ask that self-tests can finally be provided by doctors and nurses. We also ask that pharmacies can directly perform rapid diagnostic orientation tests (TRODs). Everything must be done so that the fear of Covid does not hinder screening for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs).

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