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Antiretroviral Adherence Interventions in Southern Africa: Implications for Using HIV Treatments for Prevention

  • The Science of Prevention (SC Kalichman, Section Editor)
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Abstract

There is concern that the expansion of ART (antiretroviral treatment) programmes to incorporate the use of treatment as prevention (TasP) may be associated with low levels of adherence and retention in care, resulting in the increased spread of drug-resistant HIV. We review research published over the past year that reports on interventions to improve adherence and retention in care in Southern Africa, and discuss these in terms of their potential to support the expansion of ART programmes for TasP. We found eight articles published since January 2012, seven of which were from South Africa. The papers describe innovative models for ART care and adherence support, some of which have the potential to facilitate the ongoing scale- up of treatment programmes for increased coverage and TasP. The extent to which interventions from South Africa can be effectively implemented in other, lower-resource Southern African countries is unclear.

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Notes

  1. Coverage was defined in this study as the proportion of all HIV-infected individuals receiving ART [7].

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Papers of interest, published within the annual period of review, have been highlighted • Of importance

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Conflict of Interest

Sarah Dewing, Cathy Mathews, Geoffrey Fatti, Ashraf Grimwood, and Andrew Boulle declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Health Systems Research Unit, Medical Research Council of South Africa, PO Box 19070, Tygerberg, 7505, South Africa

    Sarah Dewing & Cathy Mathews

  2. Kheth’Impilo, PO Box 13942, Mowbray, 7705, Cape Town, South Africa

    Geoffrey Fatti & Ashraf Grimwood

  3. School of Public Health and Family Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town, Falmouth Building, Observatory, 7925, South Africa

    Andrew Boulle

  4. School of Public Health and Family Medicine, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa

    Cathy Mathews

  5. Department of Psychiatry and Mental Health, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa

    Cathy Mathews

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  1. Sarah Dewing
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  2. Cathy Mathews
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  3. Geoffrey Fatti
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  4. Ashraf Grimwood
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  5. Andrew Boulle
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Correspondence to Sarah Dewing.

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Dewing, S., Mathews, C., Fatti, G. et al. Antiretroviral Adherence Interventions in Southern Africa: Implications for Using HIV Treatments for Prevention. Curr HIV/AIDS Rep 11, 63–71 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11904-013-0193-5

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