HIV prevention refers to practices that aim to prevent the spread of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). HIV prevention practices may be undertaken by individuals to protect their own health and the health of those in their community, or may be instituted by governments and community-based organizations as public health policies.
Prevention strategies
Interventions for the prevention of HIV include the use of:
Barrier methods, such as the use of condoms or dental dams during sexual activity Antiretroviral medicines or antiretroviral therapy (ART) Pre-exposure prophylaxis Postexposure prophylaxis Voluntary male circumcision (see also Circumcision and HIV) Microbicides for sexually transmitted diseases Low dead space syringes
The consistent, correct use of condoms is one proven method for preventing the spread of HIV during sexual intercourse. In high income countries, Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission Programs (PMTC) including HIV testing of pregnant women, antiretroviral treatment, counselling about infant feeding, and safe obstetric practices (avoiding invasive procedures) have reduced mother-to-child transmission to less than 1%.
Treatment as prevention (TasP) is also effective; in sero-different couples (where one partner is HIV-positive and the other is HIV negative), HIV is significantly less likely to be transmitted to the uninfected partner if the HIV positive partner is on treatment. It is now known that an if HIV-positive person has an undetectable viral load, there is no risk of HIV transmission to a sexual partner
Increased risk of contracting HIV correlates with the presence of co-infections, particularly other sexually transmissible infections. Medical professionals recommend treatment or prevention of other infections such as herpes, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, human papillomavirus, syphilis, gonorrhea, and tuberculosis as an indirect way to prevent the spread of HIV infection. Doctors treat these conditions with pharmaceutical interventions and/or vaccination. Nevertheless, it is not known if treating other sexually transmitted infections on a population scale is effective in preventing HIV.
Harm reduction and social strategies
Harm reduction is defined as "policies, programmes and practices that aim to minimise negative health, social and legal impacts associated with drug use, drug policies and drug laws". The World Health Organization (WHO) recognizes that harm reduction is central to the prevention of HIV amongst people who inject drugs (PWID) and their sexual and drug using partners. Social strategies do not require any drug or object to be effective, but rather require persons to change their behaviors to gain protection from HIV. Some social strategies include:
Needle-and-syringe programmes
Supervised injection site
Sex education
LGBT sex education
Safe sex
Serosorting
Sexual abstinence
Each of these strategies has widely differing levels of efficacy, social acceptance, and acceptance in the medical and scientific communities.
Populations who access HIV testing are less likely to engage in behaviors with high risk of contracting HIV, so HIV testing is almost always a part of any strategy to encourage people to change their behaviors to become less likely to contract HIV. Over 60 countries impose some form of travel restriction, either for short or long-term stays, for people infected with HIV.
Advertising and campaigns
Persuasive messages delivered through health advertising and social marketing campaigns which are designed to educate people about the risks of HIV/AIDS and simple prevention strategies are also an important way of preventing HIV. These persuasive messages have successfully increased people's knowledge about HIV. More importantly, information sent out through advertising and social marketing also proves to be effective in promoting more favorable attitudes and intentions toward future condom use, though they did not bring significant change in actual behaviors except those were targeting at specific behavioral skills.
A 2020 systematic review of 16 studies found that financial education improved self-efficacy and lowered vulnerability to HIV in young people in low and middle income countries. Many of the studies in the review combined financial education with sexual health education and/or counselling.