Was the "ABC" Approach (Abstinence, Being Faithful, Using Condoms) Responsible for Uganda's Decline in HIV?

Although Uganda's "successes over the course of the HIV/AIDS epidemic must not be overlooked," abstinence "was not the primary focus of the public health campaigns" in the country during the 1990s, Elaine Murphy, scholar-in-residence at the Population Reference Bureau, and colleagues write in a PLoS Medicine debate feature. Murphy and colleagues say that researchers "still don't know the most effective strategy for decreasing the number of new cases of HIV in Africa," but "[g]iven the lack of evidence underpinning the abstinence strategy in the first place, it is crucial that condom use and education be emphasized" for the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief to reach its target of preventing seven million new HIV cases by 2010. "The sooner we confront HIV/AIDS as the multifaceted and complex issue it is, the sooner we can make important steps towards progress in HIV prevention," Murphy and colleagues conclude (Murphy et al., PLoS Medicine, September 2006).

Back to other news for September 15, 2006