UNAIDS welcomes new WHO guidelines for HIV testing, counseling, ART for couples

Apr 21 2012

UNAIDS on Thursday "called on all countries to implement new [WHO] guidelines that encourage couples to go together for HIV testing to ascertain their status" and recommend offering antiretroviral therapy (ART) to people living with HIV who have a partner without HIV, "even when they do not require it for their own health," the U.N. News Centre reports. UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibe said, "I am excited that with the rollout of these new guidelines, millions of men and women have one additional option to stop new HIV infections. ... This development begins a new era of HIV prevention dialogue and hope among couples" (4/19). "Earlier treatment, of course, will need more money for more drugs for more people," Guardian Health Editor Sarah Boseley writes in her Global Health Blog, adding, "Campaigners will be looking anxiously to the reviving fortunes of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, as well as the prospects for more money for PEPFAR" (4/19).