World AIDS Day: Nine things you should know about HIV in Canada
From TheGlobeandMail.com
As the globe marks World AIDS Day on Monday, we turn our attention to HIV/AIDS here at home with nine surprising facts about HIV in Canada.
1. A person is infected with HIV in Canada every three hours.
In Saskatchewan, where the prevalence rate is three times the national average, a person is infected even more frequently.
2. Twenty-five per cent of HIV-positive people in Canada don’t know they’re infected.
The proportion of heterosexual people who don’t know they’re infected is even higher (34 per cent).
3. There’s already a drug that could prevent transmission – but Health Canada hasn’t approved it.
Truvada, a drug usually prescribed as a first-line treatment for HIV-positive people, is now being heralded as the first “HIV prevention pill.” The idea is that someone without HIV can take a daily dose of Truvada and if they are exposed to the virus, their chances of being infected are significantly reduced. Some say it’s the beginning of the end of HIV in North America but others worry that it will discourage condom use. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Truvada for preventative use in 2012, but Health Canada has yet to give it the go-ahead. A clinical trial is under way in Toronto to test its effectiveness for gay and bisexual men.
See more here.