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BackgroundApproximately 38,000 new human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infections occur in the United States each year; these infections can be prevented. A proposed national initiative, Ending the HIV Epidemic: A Plan for America, incorporates three strategies (diagnose, treat, and prevent HIV infection) and seeks to leverage testing, treatment, and preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to reduce new HIV infections in the United States by at least 90% by 2030. Targets to reach this goal include that at least 95% of persons with HIV receive a diagnosis, 95% of persons with diagnosed HIV infection have a suppressed viral load, and 50% of those at increased risk for acquiring HIV are prescribed PrEP. Using surveillance, pharmacy, and other data, CDC determined the current status of these three initiative strategies.MethodsCDC analyzed HIV surveillance data to estimate annual number of new HIV infections (2013–2017); estimate the percentage of infections that were diagnosed (2017); and determine the percentage of persons with diagnosed HIV infection with viral load suppression (2017). CDC analyzed surveillance, pharmacy, and other data to estimate PrEP coverage, reported as a percentage and calculated as the number of persons who were prescribed PrEP divided by the estimated number of persons with indications for PrEP.ResultsThe number of new HIV infections remained stable from 2013 (38,500) to 2017 (37,500) (p = 0.448). In 2017, an estimated 85.8% of infections were diagnosed. Among 854,206 persons with diagnosed HIV infection in 42 jurisdictions with complete reporting of laboratory data, 62.7% had a suppressed viral load. Among an estimated 1.2 million persons with indications for use of PrEP, 18.1% had been prescribed PrEP in 2018.ConclusionAccelerated efforts to diagnose, treat, and prevent HIV infection are needed to achieve the U.S. goal of at least 90% reduction in the number of new HIV infections by 2030.

Our analytic method provides the only feasible means to monitor PrEP uptake in the United States. Although a marked increasing trend in uptake was observed for men, the number of women who used PrEP remained very low during the study period. Interventions are needed to increase PrEP use by women at substantial risk of acquiring HIV infection.

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China's high-speed socioeconomic development has been characterized by rapid urbanization and a series of ecological environment issues, especially air pollution. This paper proposed a comprehensive indicator system for the evaluation of urbanization and the air environment in Wuhan, a metropolis in central China, and then investigated the relationship between urbanization and the air environment from the perspective of coupling coordination theory. Furthermore, a coupling coordination degree model (CCDM) was constructed to estimate the relationship by using panel data collected from 1996-2013. The results showed the following: (1) Spatial urbanization and air environment quality make the greatest contributions to the compound system compared to other first grade indicators, indicating that they are critical factors to consider when the government is making relevant decisions about urban sprawl. (2) The comprehensive level of the air environment initially decreased from 1996-1998 and then increased with fluctuations in Wuhan, with several inflection points, meaning that the variation process of the air environment is unstable and repetitive, and efforts to improve the air environment must persist over a long period of time. Lastly, (3) the degree of coordinated coupling between urbanization and the air environment exhibited an S-shaped curve, indicating that Wuhan changed from having slightly unbalanced development to barely balanced development and then entered into a OPEN ACCESSAtmosphere 2015, 6 1540 period of superiorly balanced development, with the air environment lagging. Thus, the ambient urban air quality has been subject to great pressure, and the government should continue to take effective action to improve it.

Background Daily oral pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is highly effective in preventing human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection if used adherently throughout periods of HIV risk. We estimated PrEP persistence among cohorts of persons with commercial or Medicaid insurance. Methods We analyzed data from the IBM MarketScan Research Database to identify persons aged 18–64 years who initiated PrEP between 2012 and 2017. We assessed PrEP persistence by calculating the time period that each person continued filling PrEP prescriptions until there was a gap in prescription fills > 30 days. We used Kaplan-Meier time-to-event methods to estimate the proportion of PrEP users who persisted with PrEP at 3, 6, and 12 months after initiation, and constructed Cox proportional hazards models to determine patient characteristics associated with nonpersistence. Results We studied 11 807 commercially insured and 647 Medicaid insured persons with PrEP prescriptions. Commercially insured patients persisted for a median time of 13.7 months (95% confidence interval [CI], 13.3–14.1), compared to 6.8 months (95% CI, 6.1–7.6) among Medicaid patients. Additionally, female sex, younger age, residence in rural location, and black race were associated with shorter persistence. After adjusting for covariates, we found that female sex (hazard ratio [HR], 1.81 [95% CI, 1.56–2.11]) and younger age (18–24 years: HR, 2.38 [95% CI, 2.11–2.69]) predicted nonpersistence. Conclusions More than half of commercially insured persons who initiated PrEP persisted with it for 12 months, compared to a third of those with Medicaid. A better understanding of reasons for nonpersistence is important to support persistent PrEP use and to develop interventions designed for the diverse needs of at-risk populations.

Background Uptake of HIV preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP) has been increasing in the United States since its FDA approval in 2012; however, the COVID-19 pandemic may have affected this trend. Our objective was to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on PrEP prescriptions in the United States. Methods We analyzed data from a national pharmacy database from January 2017 through March 2021 to fit an interrupted time-series model that predicted PrEP prescriptions and new PrEP users had the pandemic not occurred. Observed PrEP prescriptions and new users were compared with those predicted by the model. Main outcomes were weekly numbers of PrEP prescriptions and new PrEP users based on a previously developed algorithm. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic was quantified by computing rate ratios and percent decreases between the observed and predicted counts during 3/15/2020 – 3/31/2021. Results In the absence of the pandemic, our model predicted that there would have been 1,058,162 PrEP prescriptions during 3/15/2020 – 3/31/2021. We observed 825,239 PrEP prescriptions, a 22.0% reduction (95% CI: 19.1%-24.8%) after the emergency declaration. The model predicted 167,720 new PrEP users during the same period; we observed 125,793 new PrEP users, a 25.0% reduction (95% CI: 20.9%-28.9%). The COVID-19 impact was greater among younger persons and those with commercial insurance. The impact of the pandemic varied markedly across states. Conclusion The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted an increasing trend in PrEP prescriptions in the United States, highlighting the need for innovative interventions to maintain access to HIV prevention services during similar emergencies.

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