HIV-AIDS cure news update 2017: Bill Gates invests $140 million on drug delivery pump for HIV prevention
With the new year comes a new hope for medical breakthroughs. And thanks to billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates, the international scientific community may soon discover an effective way to conquer HIV and AIDS.
As reported by The Wall Street Journal, the Bill & Melina Gates Foundation is investing as much as $140 million in order to support the development of a tiny implantable drug pump, which could help prevent people in sub-Saharan Africa and other parts of the world from getting infected with HIV, the virus which causes AIDS.
The money was reportedly invested in Intarcia Therapeutics, the company behind the pump, which was initially devised to continuously deliver medicine all over the body of patients who suffer from type-two diabetes.
It is believed that the drug pump could also be utilized in a similar way in order to prevent HIV infections from developing in healthy patients. Using the pump, preventative medicine like PrEP could be administered in continuous dosages to sexually-active adults, consequently preventing HIV infections.
As reported by the International Business Times, Gates' foundation invested $50 million in equity stakes to Intarcia Therapeutics and added $90 million in grants to help fulfill the company's goal of developing the pump device that could prevent the spread of HIV.
"There's a vital need for an HIV/AIDS intervention that allows those at risk to incorporate prevention more easily into their daily lives," Sue Desmond-Hellmann, CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, told Quartz.
Although the drug-delivery pump would not be able to cure those who have already been infected with HIV, its development could lead to a great victory in the continuing battle against the global epidemic which had already taken nearly 35 million lives.
There are also reports that Intarcia Therapeutics could be planning to create its own HIV-preventative drug to be administered using their own devised drug-delivery pump.