ViiV Healthcare* collaborates to expand freedom and choice in access to innovative HIV prevention options which aims to protect people, communities, health outcomes, public health and health security. Innovative HIV prevention options offer the potential to accelerate the global HIV prevention response which is considerably off-track. Options to prevent HIV include Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP),¹ which aims to deliver a high-impact solution. This seeks to provide more targeted, people-centred care to improve health outcomes for diverse communities who are disproportionately impacted by HIV transmission and could benefit from a wider range of HIV prevention options. We are currently investigating long-acting delivery technologies, including new mechanisms of action. These investigational options may have the potential to offer increased choice, convenience, and discreet prevention options – to complement existing alternatives.

ViiV Healthcare was a key technical and financial contributor to several public-private partnership HIV prevention projects with the HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN), the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Gilead Sciences.² Our clinical HIV prevention research collaborations aim to support a broad spectrum of under-represented and under-served population groups disproportionately impacted by HIV through inequality and vulnerability. This includes key and priority populations across a range of demographics from young Black men, gay men and other men who have sex with men, transgender women, as well as cisgender women across South America, Asia, and Africa.

In December 2021 and August 2022 respectively, regulators in the US and Australia approved ViiV Healthcare’s long-acting injectable PrEP option to reduce the risk of sexually transmitted HIV.  ViiV Healthcare has also made regulatory submissions in some countries which took part in the clinical trials for long-acting injectable PrEP, including Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, South Africa and Eswatini (which relies on South Africa’s regulatory agency), Uganda, and Zimbabwe.³

ViiV Healthcare is committed to licensing its patents for cabotegravir long-acting (LA) for Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) and announced a voluntary licence with the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) in late July 2022.⁴ In addition, AVAC,** Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), MedAccess, Unitaid and ViiV Healthcare recently announced a collaboration to explore affordability pathways for CAB LA for PrEP.⁵

While this approach will be critical for access, it is a complex process driven by the manufacturing, capital investment and less well-defined product demand; all of which may present challenges for any originator and future generic licensees. This underscores the importance of shared responsibility, accountability and solidarity across the public, private and not-for-profit sectors to collectively deliver on shared, bold access commitments.

We are committed to implementation research to better understand how to improve access to HIV prevention options for diverse populations through people-centred quality care in low-and-middle income countries. This implementation science approach is critical to our access to medicine commitments. Therefore, we are investing in collaborative strategic implementation science projects, including Unitaid, to generate the data required to inform public health guidelines, policies, and clinical practice, as well as to enable governments, funders, and donors to target HIV prevention investments for impact.

*ViiV Healthcare is the only global biopharmaceutical company 100% focused on combating, preventing, and ultimately curing HIV and ending AIDS as a public health threat by 2030. Our shared purpose is to unite science, talent, and technology, to get ahead of a leading chronic and infectious disease for greater health impact. We were established in November 2009, through a science-led partnership between GSK (our majority shareholder) and Pfizer; with Shionogi joining in 2012. We are dedicated to researching and delivering innovative HIV medicines and solutions with an ambition to make HIV a smaller part of people’s lives. In addition, we work in solidarity with HIV communities across the globe, this includes people living with HIV and diverse communities vulnerable to HIV transmission. We collaborate to build multisector partnerships which seek to accelerate progress aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals to leave no person living with HIV behind.

**AVAC is a not-for-profit organisation which works to accelerate the ethical development and global delivery of HIV prevention options

References

1. Access to Medicines Index. (2021). ATMI Report 2021. 2021 Access to Medicine Index. Available from: https://accesstomedicinefoundation.org/publications/2021-access-to-medicine-index. Last accessed: August 2022.
2. ViiV Healthcare (2020). Global HIV prevention study to stop early after ViiV Healthcare’s long-acting injectable formulation of cabotegravir dosed every two months shows higher efficacy than daily oral PrEP. Available from https://viivhealthcare.com/hiv-news-and-media/news/press-releases/2020/may/global-hiv-prevention-study-to-stop-early-after-viiv-healthcares/. Last accessed: August 2022.
3. ViiV Healthcare (2021). ViiV Healthcare announces FDA approval of Apretude (cabotegravir extended-release injectable suspension), the first and only long-acting injectable option for HIV prevention. Available from https://viivhealthcare.com/hiv-news-and-media/news/press-releases/2021/december/viiv-healthcare-announces-fda-approval-of-apretude/. Last accessed: August 2022.
4. ViiV Healthcare (2022). ViiV Healthcare and the Medicines Patent Pool sign new voluntary licensing agreement to expand access to innovative long-acting HIV prevention medicine. Available from https://viivhealthcare.com/hiv-news-and-media/news/press-releases/2022/july/viiv-healthcare-and-the-medicines-patent-pool/ Last accessed: August 2022.
5. ViiV Healthcare (2022). AVAC, BMGF, CIFF, MedAccess, Unitaid and ViiV Healthcare announce collaboration to catalyse more affordable access to long-acting cabotegravir for HIV prevention. Available from https://viivhealthcare.com/hiv-news-and-media/news/press-releases/2022/july/avac-bmgf-ciff-medaccess-unitaid-and-viiv-healthcare/. Last accessed: August 2022.