AHF Highlights “Reaching Common Ground on PrEP’ in New National Ad Campaign

In News by AHF

AHF’s ad campaign, which offers principles for the administration of PrEP for the community’s consideration, starts Aug. 19th in newspapers and magazines in seven markets or cities nationwide:

New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Atlanta, Dallas, Washington, DC and South Florida.

 

“At the end of the day, PrEP is an individual option not a general solution.”

Michael Weinstein, President, AHF

 

LOS ANGELES (August 14, 2015) Starting Wednesday, August 19th, AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) will launch a new national ad campaign, “Reaching Common Ground on PrEP,” in which AHF offers principles for the administration of PrEP for the community’s consideration. In the ad, AHF puts forth eleven separate principles for the administration and use of Gilead Science’s AIDS treatment Truvada for pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) for HIV prevention.

AHF ad notes, “A sometimes emotional debate over the proper use of Truvada for prevention of HIV has now been raging for the last several years. Based on the current available scientific data, AIDS Healthcare Foundation offers the following principles for the administration of PrEP for the community’s consideration:” The ad then itemizes eleven principles or guidelines for consideration by individuals considering PrEP as well as for medical providers who may be contemplating prescribing it for their patients. Some of the key principles outlined by AHF for the administration of PrEP include:

  • Those who have not and will not use condoms and are having multiple sexual partners are the best candidates for PrEP.
  • Those who use condoms with every partner do not require PrEP.
  • The decision to begin PrEP should be thoroughly discussed with one’s medical provider—including adherence, which should be monitored closely—and patients should be counseled to take the drug daily.

“At the end of the day, PrEP is an individual option not a general solution,” said Michael Weinstein, president of AHF. “We believe PrEP should be prescribed on a case-by-case basis by medical providers working in conjunction with their patients, not as a community-wide public health intervention strategy, as the CDC recommended last summer when it recommended that 500,000 high-risk individuals go on PrEP.”

In May 2014, the CDC recommended that 500,000 men-who-have-sex-with-men and other high-risk individuals go on PrEP, despite the fact that data from nearly all major PrEP studies do not support such large-scale public deployment of PrEP due to medication adherence issues: Even in carefully monitored clinical trials demonstrating the drug’s clinical efficacy, many study participants simply did NOT take the medication every day as prescribed.

AHF’s “Reaching Common Ground on PrEP,” ad will run in newspapers and magazines in seven (7) markets or cities nationwide and hit the streets this week: South Florida (‘South Florida Gay News’ and ‘Florida Agenda,’ issue date: August 19th); New York (in ‘Gay City News,’ issue date: August 20th); Los Angeles (‘Frontiers Newsmagazine,’ issue date: August 20th); San Francisco (‘Bay Area Reporter,’ issue date: August 20th); Dallas (‘Dallas Voice,’ issue date: August 20th); Atlanta (‘GA Voice’ online issue date: August 21st) and Washington, DC (‘The Washington Blade’ issue date: August 20th and ‘Metro Weekly,’ issue date: August 21st)

To view the ‘Reaching Common Ground on PrEP’ and review all eleven of AHF’s suggested principles on PrEP, click here

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