South Africa’s HIV programme is the biggest in the world, and according to the latest data of the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), good progress is being made in addressing the HIV epidemic in terms of the UNAIDS 90-90-90 targets (90% living with HIV know their status, 90% of these on antiretroviral treatment, and 90% with undetectable viral loads).

But close analysis of the data confirms that most of the gains are occurring in females. A telling example of this is the fact that the rate of HIV infection in females aged 15–24 has fallen from 2.04% in 2012 to 1.51% in 2017, whereas in males of the same age group HIV incidence has increased slightly from 0.44% to 0.49%.

Shorter lives

As HIV expert Dr Francois Venter said, the HSRC data shows that, compared to women, “men come in later and sicker, are less likely to take their therapy and more likely to drop out of treatment programmes”. Read more via Health24