In this week’s PLOS Medicine, Anna Borquez from Imperial College London and an international group of authors developed a mathematical model representing the HIV epidemic among men who have sex with men (MSM) and transwomen in Lima, Peru as a test-case for the effectiveness of HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). The model was used to investigate the population-level impact, cost, and cost-effectiveness of PrEP under a range of different scenarios. The authors found that strategic PrEP intervention could be a cost-effective addition to existing HIV prevention strategies for MSM populations. However, despite being cost-effective, a substantial expenditure would be required to generate significant reductions in incidence of HIV.

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Funding: This work was principally funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Additional funding: the Medical Research Council UK, The Wellcome Trust, US National Institutes of Health, and The Gladstone Institutes. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Citation: Gomez GB, Borquez A, Caceres CF, Segura ER, Grant RM, et al. (2012) The Potential Impact of Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis for HIV Prevention among Men Who Have Sex with Men and Transwomen in Lima, Peru: A Mathematical Modelling Study. PLoS Med 9(10): e1001323. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1001323

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CONTACT:

Annick Borquez
School of Public Health
Imperial College London, United Kingdom
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

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Sumrina Yousufzai
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
415-568-3164
Public Library of Science