After a change linked to the Covid pandemic, the use of PrEP (for pre-exposure prophylaxis, editor’s note), a preventive treatment to avoid becoming infected with the AIDS virus, is in “sustained recovery” in France, according to a report released Tuesday. .
In the first half of 2022, the number of users reached 42,583, an increase of 40% in one year, specifies the report from the Epi-Phare structure, which associates the Health Insurance (Cnam) and the Medicines Agency (ANSM ).
“Following the change” in 2020 “in connection with the Covid-19 epidemic, the resumption of PrEP initiations, scheduled for the first half of 2021, was confirmed in the second half of 2021 and the first half of 2022”, according to the report released two days before World AIDS Day.
The proportion of women using PrEP is increasing
Users are still “mainly men, with an average age of 36, residing in the Île-de-France or in a large metropolis and among whom the proportion of recipients of complementary CMU or AME (State Medical Aid) is low” , notes Epi-Phare.
“The slow spread of PrEP to non-MSM (men who have sex with men) population groups in major cities has continued, but remains limited,” according to the report.
Thus, the proportion of women increased but remained “marginal” (4% in the first half of 2022 compared to 2% a year earlier).
PrEP is a preventive treatment for people who are HIV negative. The person following him takes antiretroviral pills (Truvada and its generics) to avoid HIV contamination during sex without a condom. After successful clinical trials, its effectiveness in real life was confirmed last July.
As of June 1, 2021, all doctors, in particular general practitioners, you can make the first prescription for this treatment. Previously, the treating doctor could only renew the prescription, and the first prescription could only be made by practicing doctors in hospitals or in a free center for information, detection and diagnosis (CeGIDD).
Almost triple the number of first recipes
The recent period shows “a sharp increase” in prescribing by general practitioners, according to Epi-Phare. Nearly 3,800 first-time PrEP prescriptions in the first half of 2022 came from liberal prescribers, 88% of whom were GPs, up from 1,389 the year before.
Even so, “the account is not there”: PrEP “has not spread sufficiently” beyond homosexuals “despite the prescription in the city”, lamented Gilles Pialoux, vice president of the French Society for the fight against AIDS, during a press conference on Monday by the ANRS/Emerging Infectious Diseases.
Source: BFM TV
