Like ACSH itself, ACSH advisor Dr. Jeffrey Singer is a proponent of harm reduction. Here's his take on a report, issued by the health and medicine panel of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM), titled "Opportunities to Improve Opioid Use Disorder and Infectious Disease Services." Not surprisingly, Dr. Singer calls for needle exchange, methadone use, and the use of prescribing pre‐exposure HIV prophylaxis (PrEP) and post‐exposure prophylaxis (PEP).
PrEP
A recent study, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, claims the cost-effectiveness of providing pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to individuals who engage in injected drug use. Outside of a controlled clinical setting, however, this would not be a wise public health choice.
Truvada has repeatedly been shown to prevent sexual transmission of HIV. Yet women require more of the drug than men for protection from infection, according to a new study published in the Journal of Infectious Diseases.
Rather than taking AIDS medication prophylactically on a daily basis, it's now possible to use it the following day, a practice that still prevents infection quite well. While this is surprisingly good news, there are also downsides to this approach.
Truvada, a prescription drug used to prevent HIV infection, was recommended earlier this year by the CDC in combination with condoms for high-risk individuals. However, despite