from Hacker News

A Man Stopped Thousands of People Becoming HIV-Positive

by rb2e on 2/25/17, 3:16 PM with 48 comments

  • by gaythrowaway on 2/25/17, 6:58 PM

    I'm a 30-something gay dude on PREP. I primarily take it because I'm in a sero-discordant relationship with my boyfriend who is HIV+, but also as a safety precaution for when I was single and hooking up.

    PREP has the potential to completely turn the tide on HIV infections. I live in a mid-sized midwestern city where between 10 and 25% of gay dudes in my dating pool are HIV+, many of them unknowingly and therefore continuing to spread it. There is a big push from the local public health department to get gay guys at risk of contracting HIV on PREP and it is starting to pay off.

    PREP also is helping reduce the stigma of having HIV. Many people who are HIV+ live with a huge mental health burden of dealing with feeling like they are going to be rejected as a romantic partner because of their HIV status. With PREP as an option this helps reduce that burden. I'm not necessarily proud of this but I'm not sure if I would be dating my current boyfriend if PREP were not available because of the risk it could present to my health. He's an amazing guy and having this issue out of the way for us has been very helpful for us.

    That's not to say that it doesn't have side effects and that it should be carefully considered but it really needs to be publicized more as a preventative treatment option in high risk populations.

  • by nothrabannosir on 2/25/17, 6:24 PM

    I'll second the call to donating:

    https://www.iwantprepnow.co.uk/about-us-donate

    > “I’m thinking, ‘You don’t know I have to walk sometimes because I can’t afford my Oyster [the London bus and tube pass]. You don’t know that I’m literally eating once a day because I’m so broke, and I’m sleeping on someone’s sofa because no one is going to pay me to do this,’” he says. “I am no different to how I was when I was a sex worker.”

  • by buro9 on 2/25/17, 6:02 PM

    What a great guy and group of people.

    I've emailed offering to help out if I can. Their costs of running the site should be zero to them, if I can help make that so then great.

  • by DanBC on 2/25/17, 7:17 PM

    The NHS has recently announced an expansion of the trial: https://www.england.nhs.uk/2016/12/hiv-prevention-pregramme/

    There was some confusion about who should be paying for this preventative treatment. Both sexual health and prevention is normally part of Public Health and not the NHS, but public health weren't paying. This is because funding to local authorities has been slashed. Remember this when conservative supporters tell you that funding for health care has increased: they're not including the cuts to public health.

    This is explained a bit here: https://www.england.nhs.uk/2016/11/update-on-prep/

    A statement from public health: http://www.adph.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/ADPH-PrEP-...

    A statement from earlier NHS: https://www.england.nhs.uk/2016/08/august-update-on-the-comm...

  • by h4nkoslo on 2/26/17, 6:02 AM

    One consequence of gay organizations deciding to focus all of their energies on punishing rubes in flyover country via gay marriage campaigns has been a significant de-emphasis on HIV education / treatment / prevention. The latter has actually done us significant amounts of good and it's a shame to see it wasted in favor of spite.

  • by joshstrange on 2/25/17, 10:09 PM

    Last time I checked on my insurance it was going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of $1K/mo for PrEP. Now minimums would be met soon enough but still way too expensive. The website mentioned in the article appears to sell it for ~$54/mo which is crazy.

  • by dankohn1 on 2/25/17, 5:37 PM

    It's an inspiring story. I can't wait to see the movie adaptation.

  • by Animats on 2/25/17, 7:06 PM

    The real issue is simply that the cost for Truvada oral tablet (100 mg-150 mg) is around $1,564 for a supply of 30 tablets. In the US, the patents expire in 2021.

  • by andrewtbham on 2/25/17, 4:44 PM

    too bad these companies don't have an affiliate program.

    https://www.iwantprepnow.co.uk/buy-prep-now

  • by masonic on 2/26/17, 5:34 AM

    This is sloppy reporting:

    "In the space of 12 months, the number of gay men in London being diagnosed with HIV had dropped by 40%. Across England it was down by a third."

    The New Scientist article they link to has it correct -- this is a drop in reported new infections, not a drop in infected persons. It still hasn't been corrected.