If this pill is truly what they say it i it could be a major breakthrough for countries with a serious outbreak of the deadly virus.

Two new studies found that daily pills prevented infection with the AIDS virus in heterosexual men and women in Africa, bringing new hope for someday offering a medical shield against HIV infection.

“This is good news. This is a good day for HIV prevention,” said Dr. Lynn Paxton of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who has coordinated the agency’s research into HIV prevention.

Earlier this year, another study found the same pills did not prevent the AIDS virus among women in Kenya, Tanzania and South Africa. But researchers now say that study may have been flawed based on the success of the two studies announced Wednesday.

The first of the new studies, run by the CDC, involved more than 1,200 men and women in Botswana. About half got a daily pill, Truvada, an HIV treatment made by Gilead Sciences Inc. The other half got a fake pill.

An analysis of people who were believed to be regularly taking the pills found four of those on Truvada became infected with HIV, compared with 19 on the dummy pill. That means the real drug lowered the risk of infection by roughly 78%, researchers said.

The second study was funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and run by the University of Washington. It involved more than 4,700 heterosexual couples in Kenya and Uganda. In each couple, one partner had HIV and the other did not. The uninfected were given either daily placebos, Truvada pills, or another Gilead treatment, Viread.

The study found 13 HIV infections among those on Truvada, 18 in those on Viread, and 47 of those on dummy pills. So the medications reduced the risk of HIV infection by 62% to 73%, the researchers said.

Hopefully, these findings are accurate and true. The spread of HIV is clearly a major health risk to people all across the world and anything that can help reduce that risk is imperative to all of our quality of life.

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