A vaginal gel containing Gilead Sciences Inc.’s AIDS drug Viread cut HIV infections by as much as 54 percent in a trial in South Africa. Among 445 women who applied the gel before and after sex, there were 39 percent fewer HIV infections overall than among those who used a placebo gel, according to the trial results released today by the journal Science. There were 54 percent fewer infections among those who used the gel more than 80 percent of the time and a 28 percent reduction among those who used it least.

The gel was developed by Conrad, a nonprofit organization based in Arlington, Virginia, and funded by the U.S. government and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, under royalty-free license from Foster City, California-based Gilead, the world’s biggest maker of AIDS medicines.

Gilead, which donated the active ingredient in the gel, won’t participate in the commercialization of the product in developing nations. It’s “an open question” as to whether the company markets it in the U.S. and Europe, he said.

This compound and study could be related to ASX Starpharma's play re HIV prevention.

Source: Bloomberg