Nairobi — Access to a twice-yearly HIV prevention injection is moving closer to millions of people in low- and middle-income countries after Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories secured tentative approval from the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the first generic version of lenacapavir. The regulatory milestone, secured just 16 months after approval of Gilead…
Climate change doesn’t change the virus or make it more infectious or deadly. It changes the infrastructure and systems – such as roads, clinics and patient records – that hold HIV in check. Here’s how the two connect, and how to report it. On 12 April 2022, Mfundo Shezi woke when the skies cracked open…
IN SHORT: A graphic circulating online in South Africa and Nigeria warns of criminals claiming to test blood sugar for free, only to infect people with HIV instead. But this hoax circulated in the Philippines in 2025, and the country’s health department debunked it. According to a shocking claim sent to Africa Check by subscribers…
As the Democratic Republic of the Congo responds to the Ebola outbreak in Ituri, there are growing concerns about people living with HIV missing their regular care and treatment. Fear of Ebola, insecurity and pressure on health services are making it harder for some patients to reach health facilities. For people living with HIV, missing…
Gilead Bixlenvo drug Courtesy: Gilead The Food and Drug Administration approved a once-daily HIV pill from Gilead that could help simplify care for some patients, the company announced Thursday. The drug, marketed as Bixlenvo, is aimed at patients whose virus is already under control but who remain on complicated treatment regimens. It could also appeal…
The Lancet HIV Commission on Ageing‘s 2026 report highlights how profoundly the global HIV epidemic is changing. In 2025, an estimated 11.5 million (29%) people living with HIV were aged 50 years and older. This is projected to increase to 20.2 million by 2040. That would account for more than half (51%) of all people…
Africa must take charge of HIV cure research or risk repeating past delays in accessing lifesaving medical innovations, the head of the Africa HIV Cure Consortium, Albert Machinda, has warned. Machinda, who is the consortium’s Principal Investigator and head of Secretariat, made the remarks during the 2026 HIV Research Community Symposium in Kampala, where he…
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil — Evidence is growing that the people most affected by HIV are also the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change. Climate change is reshaping health systems and lives across the globe, but its impact on the HIV response has received far less attention than it deserves. Floods, droughts and…
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil — The greatest barrier to ending AIDS among transgender people in Africa is not a lack of medicine, but laws, stigma and exclusion. Across sub-Saharan Africa, laws that criminalise homosexuality continue to collide with public health goals, leaving gay and bisexual men, and transgender people more broadly, dangerously underserved in the…
If an HIV prevention pill that provides a month of protection at a time performs well in two ongoing clinical trials, it could become the next big thing in HIV prevention after the lenacapavir injection. A new licensing agreement is paving the way for South Africa’s Aspen Pharmacare to produce the pill should the study…
