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Antiretroviral therapy to treat and prevent HIV/AIDS in resource-poor settings

Prior to the XIIIth World AIDS Conference in Durban, debate raged in the community over the practicalities, cost and ethics of delivering antiretroviral drugs to the developing world. Two years on, that discussion is history. Political and financial forces will now deliver these drugs to such nations. How then can we expect their arrival to alter the HIV landscape?

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Figure 1: Mathematical model simulations of the potential epidemiological impact of the use of antiviral treatments in a generalized HIV epidemic where ARVs are introduced 30 years after the start of the epidemic.

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Garnett, G., Bartley, L., Grassly, N. et al. Antiretroviral therapy to treat and prevent HIV/AIDS in resource-poor settings. Nat Med 8, 651–654 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/nm0702-651

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