Uganda is among the 11 countries that could benefit from a two-million-dollar funding towards the rollout of dapivirine vaginal ring for HIV/AIDS prevention among women.
Dapivirine sometimes called the PrEP ring a flexible silicone ring that is placed in the vagina and releases the anti-HIV drug dapivirine over a month.
The ring is available as an alternative to taking tablets for women who are unable to take daily PrEP tablets.
The PrEP ring is designed to help reduce women’s likelihood of acquiring HIV during vaginal sex.
The Global Fund, along with the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF) mid-last month announced up to US$2 million over the next year to purchase approximately 150,000 rings in countries that implement Global Fund grants to fight HIV and AIDS.
The rings donated by CIFF and Global Fund can be made available to countries such as Uganda upon request.
The partnership between CIFF and the Global Fund, which will kick off in October, aims to support early product introduction to seed the market for wider adoption of the PrEP ring.
The one-month ring currently costs US$12.8 per month of use. The initiative will create a bridge to the three-month PrEP ring, which will cost less than US$16, excluding distribution, representing a nearly 60% drop in price per month.
This follows recent news that the ring has gained regulatory approval or authorization for use in 11 countries in Eastern and Southern Africa including in Uganda where according to the WHO Uganda profile of 2023, 3% of the population lives with HIV, and 61% of whom are women and girls over the age of 15.
According to the HIV Prevention Choice Manifesto authored by and for Southern and Eastern African girls and women, choice is key to HIV prevention.
This scale-up of the dapivirine ring through Global Fund and CIFF’s collaboration ensures that girls and women have another tool to protect themselves from HIV on their own terms.
In 2022, 1.3 million people acquired HIV, far from the target of ending HIV and AIDS by 2030.
Expanding access to PrEP and other prevention tools, along with increasing treatment coverage and viral load suppression, is crucial in preventing new infections and breaking the cycle of transmission.
“The PrEP ring gives women and girls a discrete option that is entirely within their control,” said Miles Kemplay, Executive Director, Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR), CIFF.
“For too long price points have made this option inaccessible – this partnership is the first step in making the market more sustainable and increasing access for those who need it.”
The PrEP ring is manufactured by Sever Pharma Solutions in Sweden for the Population Council. A next-generation PrEP ring lasting three months will soon be under regulatory review.
“In many areas of the world, the rate of new HIV infections among adolescent girls and young women is more than three times the rate among adolescent boys and young men,” said Peter Sands, Executive Director of the Global Fund.
“This is unacceptable. We are convinced that this new PrEP ring can have a revolutionary impact. Girls and women have spoken up that they want the PrEP ring, and today’s announcement is one more stepping stone in a series of innovative approaches to give it to them.”
“We applaud CIFF and the Global Fund for their continued commitment to purchasing DapiRing,” said Bríd Devlin, Chief Scientific Officer at the Population Council’s Center for Biomedical Research.
“It is critical that women are offered a range of HIV prevention methods, including DapiRing, to meet their diverse sexual health needs and to use on their own terms. Providing women with choice in HIV prevention is the best way to end the AIDS epidemic.”
Since last year, the Global Fund has enabled procurement of the PrEP ring in Cambodia, Eswatini, Ghana, Indonesia, Mozambique, Uganda and South Africa. Procurement in Mozambique and Uganda was supported in part by CIFF’s PrEP Matching Fund.
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