Eliminate AIDS by 2030? UK thinks it’s possible. In Portugal, the author of innovative medicines has been waiting for almost two years
Specialist believes that the data can not be achieved in Portugal, and points out other flaws for medicines
The three drugs that are part of the UK’s plan to eliminate acquired immunodeficiency virus (HIV) by 2030 are waiting for two authors to be marketed in Portugal for almost years. In addition to this, Fernando Maltez, director of the Infectious Diseases service at Hospital Curry Cabral, tells CNN Portugal (from the same TVI group), there are two other factors that are equally or more important that make this goal difficult: social awareness and action , crucial issues so that they can be useful, they can be administered to the entire population, including the most displaced or misinformed people.
The three drugs on which the NHS are based on “fighting” the virus that causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) are Vocabria, Rekambys and Rukobia, with the plan going through the articulation of administration with the generalization of the same to the entire population. , especially which cases are more isolated, which is where they are identified. The first sets, through injections that can be two months, since they work until the process of two patients, through two months, until the process of treatment for the patient. Working as an HIV treatment. The third is intended for people who develop greater resistance to other retroviral treatments available. The three approved this year in the UK, who quickly moved towards their use of the program they want to see completed by 2030.
Even before that, all were also approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), which oversees pharmaceutical licenses in the European Union. Despite having been approved between the end of 2020 and the beginning of 2021, none of the drugs is currently marketed in Portugal.
The Medicines Authority (Infarmed) refers to the agreements of three medicines that are in Portugal “pre-hospital evaluation with part still”, which are being marketed under consultation.
“The drugs Vocabria (Cabotegravir) + Rembys (Rilpivirine) and Rukobia (Fostemsavir) are currently undergoing prior hospital evaluation and, accordingly, are not yet marketed in Portugal”, says Infarmed.
These three retrovirals are seen as great hopes for eliminating the infection in the world. Fernando Maltez, who will be at a drug presentation conference, highlighted, however, that “any drug has new complications that are only known in real life these drugs”, a presumed stance of these drugs.
In addition, the doctor, it is necessary to understand how each case goes to, as well as defining groups of people, such as children, pregnant women or transgender people. Therefore, he warns: “There is a set of aspects that does not allow to say that only with this can the elimination of [da SIDA] in 2030”.
UK sets target for ending epidemic
The United Kingdom follows the example defined as the objective “to end the AIDS epidemic by 2030”, based on three pillars: treatment, new infections and discrimination. A set of policy measures at a global level, but which, even, has not given the planned results to see policy at a global level. The first objective, the so-called “90-90-90”.
It is a goal that Fernando Maltez sees as ambitious, refusing to say if he thinks it will go well: “It is good that these goals are established in order to be able to fight for them, but it is difficult to get there”.
About Portugal, says the director of the Infectious Diseases service at Hospital Curry Cabral to CNN Portugal (from the same group as TVI), “there is no specific goal”, opting for the caution of “achieving the minimum number of cases in the year 2030” .
“Zero cases seem difficult to achieve. It implies not only having to make the medicine available, but also making the service available to people for fear that it will not provide a medicine due to the situation, but also that it will not provide health care, by thinking people or medicines”, says the specialist, passing that the global level will be difficult to reach the end of the epidemic in 2030.
Medication can help prevent
The executive director of the Group of Activists in Treatments (GAT) tells CNN Portugal that these three must be “approved as soon as possible and made available to people who need it”. Ricardo Fernandes that is particularly relevant in the case of Rukobia, which stands out to people whose treatment with therapies doesn’t work so well: their treatment”.
“At affordable prices and that can be medicines accessible to the population, it is necessary. These people also have few options”, refers to the member of the AIDS Treatment Group, which is very expensive for the State, not least because they are few people need it.
In addition, the person responsible for the GAT, there is another relevant one: Rukobia can also be used as a means of prophylaxis, it can work, in certain cases, as a prevention against infection, a kind of vaccine.
“There are people who do not have or cannot access means of prevention, such as condoms, who can benefit from this”, he adds.
About the other remedies, Ricardo Fernandes recalls that there is an attempt, it is similar to those already advanced, but an advantage: a form of administration. Vocabria and Rekambys are administered subcutaneously, through an injection that is given every two months. “In addition to being comfortable, it is more practical”, reinforces the activist, stressing that people can forget about taking pills daily, but that they do not forget about a periodic injection in a hospital.
Whether for approval as medicines, regardless of speed, it should always be part of a plan that includes the political and social issue, requesting, therefore, a price that is sustainable for the National Health Service. And this social part also plays a role in patient acceptance: Ricardo Fernandes says that we are going to provide medicines, but a larger association of infected people will be approved: .
Political and social challenge
Regardless of the diligence of medicines, Fernando Maltez existing the importance of political and social pillars, without being highlighted, they say, it is impossible for science to be able to eliminate a disease. This is one of the great commitments also made by the United Kingdom, which wants to generalize access to and test the entire population.
YOU latest data from the European Center for Disease or Control of ECDC countries, in the original acronym, show that there are communities for specific countries by the disease.
In Portugal, America of America HIV 50% detected from 2019 the last year that new data countries were flagged in, specifically the South. A reality that is repeated in almost all countries. In Ireland, for example, almost all cases are detected among communities of foreigners.
That’s why we have to fight against discrimination and everyone is one of the pillars of the UN, Fernando Maltez asks for greater participation and social awareness: they manage to place people with infectious viral loads, where the infection is not transmissible.
Thus, the infectious disease specialist stands out, the important thing is to generalize these practices and therapies to the entire population, including discriminated or geographically displaced communities. Although there are no official data from 2019, the doctor confirms that there is “an important proportion of new cases among immigrants, particularly from Brazil”.
These are people, he says, who may feel on the sidelines or who have not been aware of how they can receive the proper follow-up. Therefore, Fernando Maltez warns that eliminating AIDS “is not only dependent on science, it is necessary to participate and political and social action”.
Long goal numbers
According to the “90-90-90”, the number of new infected, for example, has fallen to 500,000 per year from 2020. However, according to the UN, in 2021 another 1.5 million cases were identified. , with around 650,000 AIDS-related deaths recorded last year.
84.2 million cases of epidemics, which resulted in 40.1 million associated. In Portugal, and according to the latest report, which dates from 2019 (the country suspended data communication during the covid-19 pandemic), 10,905 people have died in just over 40 years from AIDS. The number of deaths has been decreasing from year to year, confirming that the country, like its neighbors, is on a trajectory to end the disease.
For 2025, the goal becomes “95-95-95”, accounting for only 200,000 new cases worldwide. A number that has not been met, according to experts.