HIV PREVENTION DRUG TO BE AVAILABLE IN MARKET IN 2020

Gilead Sciences announced on Wednesday that a generic version of Truvada will be available in September 2020, one year earlier than expected.

Truvada is drug used for HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP. When taken daily, Truvada prevents HIV transmission.

“Gilead reached an agreement with Teva Pharmaceuticals in 2014 to allow the early launch of a generic version of Truvada into the market in 2020, a year earlier than required.

Douglas Brooks, Gilead’s executive director for community engagement, in a statement said generic Truvada will be available in countries around the world for as little as $70, in the United States a month’s supply sells for $1,600 to $2,000, and activists have mounted a pressure campaign to force Gilead to make the drug more widely available in order to curb the global HIV epidemic.

In a statement from the PrEP4All Collaboration, Dr. Aaron S. Lord said allowing just one generic manufacturer, Israel-based Teva Pharmaceuticals, to make generic PrEP “will do little to reduce the price in a way that will increase access, and PrEP4All remains suspicious of the terms and lack of transparency surrounding the Teva settlement.”