This drug is a lifesaver. I hope this doesn’t discourage anyone from taking or prescribing it.

Sometimes I feel that telling the general public shit like this is counterproductive. It presents morons with anecdotal evidence that they can base their decisions on.

@1, exactly. PrEP is part of safe sex: not an end-all. Sadly many of our celebrity spokes-models immediately said that PrEP was a bad idea and they will use this to "prove" their point.

I'm on it and never has anyone told me it was 100% protection against infection and no one should assume it is.

Is there a reason that the Truvada-resistant virus is not capable of spreading?

That said, PrEP is a lifesaver, as literally as possible.

From the CDC:

Pre-exposure prophylaxis (or PrEP) is when people at very high risk for HIV take HIV medicines daily to lower their chances of getting infected. PrEP can stop HIV from taking hold and spreading throughout your body. It is highly effective for preventing HIV if used as prescribed, but it is much less effective when not taken consistently.

Daily PrEP reduces the risk of getting HIV from sex by more than 90%. Among people who inject drugs, it reduces the risk by more than 70%. Your risk of getting HIV from sex can be even lower if you combine PrEP with condoms and other prevention methods.

10% is way too high of a threshold for anyone. So it's saving lots of reckless lives then.

Here is the breakdown of effectiveness. "More than 90 percent" is a little misleading.

According to data analysis from the iPrEx study that found PrEP to be effective:

For people who take 7 PrEP pills per week, their estimated level of protection is 99%.
For people who take 4 PrEP pills per week, their estimated level of protection is 96%.
For people who take 2 PrEP pills per week, their estimated level of protection is 76%.

Just taking a scan on side effect search results, it's hard on the kidneys.

I seem to recall Dan taking a fairly aggressive stance on the efficacy of PrEP.

@7 When you're on PrEP you get regular HIV tests and blood tests to see if it is impacting your kidneys, liver, and bone density. If they detect that it is, you can stop using PrEP everything will return to normal. I've been on it for more than a year, and have had no adverse side effects.

@7 what does "it's hard on the kidneys" mean? Are you saying people taking Truvada may suffer kidney failure?

@11: I suggest you do the research yourself for better accuracy than anything I could surmise.

Everything is hard on the kidneys. Shit, even kidney medication is hard on the kidneys.

@12: I suggest that you made the claim, therefore you have the burden of proof.

@14: I claim nothing. You can see the results for yourself, dear.

This is NOT a confirmed case of "PrEP failure." Unlike the three previous confirmed cases worldwide, there is no independent confirmation that the individual was taking the pills as directed -- just his say-so. Research trials that double-check subjects' self-reporting against measured blood levels of Truvada have found that people tend to overestimate their adherence.

It's irresponsible of Public Health officials to release this information prematurely, and accomplishes nothing but stoking panic. Worse, it will discourage some people from taking PrEP who are at high risk of HIV, and some of them will contract the virus needlessly.

Worth noting: today alone 4,500 people worldwide will contract HIV, despite near universal information about and access to condoms. Where are the daily dramatic headlines about "condom failure"? What good would it do to stoke fear of condoms, an important prevention tool? Hacking away at the credibility of PrEP is just as irresponsible.