Title

HIV elimination is now a reality for gay men: What is working and how do we replicate our successes for all?

Code

TUWS05

Session Type

Public Workshop

Venue

GV Session Room 2

Date Time

Tuesday 24 July, 11:00 - 12:30

Co-Facilitators:

Valerie Delpech, Public Health England (PHE), United Kingdom
Andrew Amato, European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, Sweden
Nikos Dedes, Athens Checkpoint, Greece
Jane Anderson, Fast track Cities, United Kingdom

Level:

Foundation

Target Audience:

Policy-maker, Activist, Epidemiologist

Seating limit:

270

This session will provide the scientific evidence behind the decline in HIV transmission observed in gay men and will transfer the knowledge of the range of interventions used to reduce transmission, including the crucial role of community activism. Facilitators and participants will share perspectives on what interventions worked best alone or in synergy, particularly capturing the views of gay men. The session will motivate the audience that the elimination of HIV transmission is possible for all key populations.

11:00 TUWS0501	Introduction and aim of workshop Valerie Delpech

11:15 TUWS0502	What’s the evidence? Valerie Delpech Andrew Grulich Charles King

11:30 TUWS0503	Making it happen Jo Holden Jane Anderson Udi Davidovich

11:45 TUWS0504	What worked? Civil society and community perspective Charles King Karen Price Yusef Azad

12:00 TUWS0505	Questions, answers and concluding remarks

AUTHOR

Brian Rice

SUMMARY

Focusing mainly on London, New York and Sydney, scientific evidence was presented to understand recent reported (through clinic / province / national level surveillance) declines in HIV transmission observed in gay men. Purpose = transfer knowledge of the range of interventions that have helped bring this decline.

HIGHLIGHTS

Valerie Delpech (PHE, UK), Andrew Grulich (UNSW Australia), and Charles King (Housing Works, USA) presented data highlighting recent declines in new HIV diagnoses among gay men. Charles King argued “viral suppression is the foundation for ending HIV”. Data on testing rates and frequency clearly highlighted importance of repeat testing among gay men at risk in eliminating HIV in these settings. Jane Anderson (Homerton University Hospital, UK) – argued having a diagnosis was key as both negative and positive diagnoses have treatment and prevention implications – also argued we need to move away from the idea that testing is to find positive diagnoses. Karen Price (ACON, Australia) stated that “We can have every tool in the toolbox but we also importantly need the leadership of people living with HIV to move forward”. Karen and Charles presented the “Ending HIV equation” which consists of test often + treat early +stay safe.

CRITICAL ASSESSMENT

This session highlighted well the importance of combination prevention and having a multi faceted approach with stakeholder engagement in a range of settings (gay community connectedness; clinician leadership; user friendly accessible clinics; national / state / city political buy-in / leadership). The session also made clear the importance of having clinic / surveillance data to inform and implement change, and to avoid potential erroneous conclusions. For example, applying CD4-back-calculation & monitoring early-infection in some settings suggested declines in transmission dated back to around 2012 rather than 2015/16 (as suggested by diagnoses data), thereby predating the roll-out of PrEP.