HIV: New Study Reinforces “Undetectable=Untransmittable”
Image Credit: NIAID
Last year’s pronouncement from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention that HIV can’t be transmitted if undetectable was big news for people with HIV, activists, and health officials. Now, just a few months shy of the anniversary of that declaration, another study is reaffirming it.
At the International AIDS Conference in Amsterdam, the PARTNER 2 study revealed that gay or bisexual men own effective HIV treatment do not carry the risk of passing on the virus even if they have unprotected sex. The study showed that in 76000 cases of gay sex where the HIV-positive person had an undetectable viral load, there were no cases of HIV being transmitted.
The new study builds on the 2014 PARTNER 1 study that had suggested people with an undetectable viral load cannot pass on HIV. However, the subjects in PARTNER1 involved both straight couples and men who have sex with men. The “Undetectable=Untransmittable” result for the PARTNER1 study was not as convincing as it was with the heterosexuals.
PARTNER 2 sought to address that by involving only men who have sex with men, in 14 countries, over the course of four years. PARTNER 2 found that there were no instances of the virus being passed on between male couples, practically “scientifically equivalent to zero”.
Alison Rodger, principal researcher for the study, even went on to say to aidsmap.com that they “looked so hard for transmissions. And we didn’t find any.”
This is definitely great news for people with HIV, following closely on the approval of Symtuza for use in the United States. We’d love to hear what you guys think of this new development in how we understand HIV transmission. Share your thoughts and opinions with us in the comments section below. Remember to keep it civil!
Studies also show that once HIV finds its way to the testes, it can live there under the same protection from your immune system as the sperm. Regardless of undetectable status, HIV in the testes may not be due to these protections. I’m sorry but this undetectable=untransmittable stuff is just simply not believable. I’m not willing to put my life abd well-being on the line for some half proven study. To each his own but anyone with half a brain would agree U does not equal U
Maybe you should actually read these articles before bothering to type your stupid onto a webpage. Since there is actual several peer-reviewed papers, none of which have been refuted, maybe your ego needs to go get some education. The current med protocols are suppressing the virus. There are several areas of the body that have protection from the immune system BUT THEY DON”T HAVE PROTECTION AGAINST MEDICATION IN THE BLOODSTREAM. You are ignorant, and people like you are a huge problem in the world today – thinking your “common sense” provides an answer that trumps research, education, and science. Either educate yourself or go crawl back into your hole. Instead of saying your sorry you don’t believe it, maybe you should be sorry for your painful levels of ignorance and arrogance.
In the more than 20 years we’ve had effective treatment, we’ve documented hundreds of thousands of sexual acts among millions of serodiscordant couples. There has not been a single documented transmission that whole time.
No, the study about HIV in the testes was not damning. The particles they found were never competent of replication. It was severely misreported and this particular website was rightly taken to task for its handling of that news. Regardless, even if there were live virus in the testes, the correlation to infection would still be ZERO. That’s significantly less than the number of infections from men who think they’re “negative”.
At this point, attempts to rationalize against U=U are border on ridiculous. This argument is very clearly less about legitimate fear or actual risk with every passing month.
This is wonderful reinforcement from last years findings and let the debates began. I’m sure guys that are affected feel more confident now and hopefully they can get more dates period. I hope people with half a brain that responds realize that this post is about Undetectable =Untransmissible. Everyone unless you been living under a rock already know about safe sex and sexually transmitted diseases. We freakin got that!!!!! Lets embrace this reinforced scientific finding. 😉
https://www.adam4adam.com/blog/2018/02/hiv-new-study-reveals-hiv-can-stay-years-testes/
This is the article that talks about HIV staying in the testes for years. Undetectable=untransmittable is only measuring HIV in the blood, it does NOT measure HIV in otjer bodily fluids and all of the LEGIT studies lay that out for the consumers of information.
That is an extremely dangerous idea to promote, one that can easily be refuted by another study. In the meantime, guys could get infected. They already found that HIV hides in the testicles, even when “undetectable.” Undetectable does NOT mean the virus is dead, only temporarily inactive. And the fact that the guy who is undetectable was careless enough to get infected in the first place renders them high-risk; and unprotected sex is totally high-risk. Your reporting in this way is highly irresponsible. Barebacking is totally unacceptable behavior. You should be reinforcing that message. Syphilis is deadly if untreatable, other diseases could mutate so, and a new virus is bound to appear sooner or later, as HIV did. So NO BAREBACKING, EVER! We are extremely fortunate that oral sex is relatively safe, so far, and must not abuse our privileges. Promiscuity is BAD. Relationships are GOOD. We have to be moral and ethical people, we have to set good examples, not only for ourselves, but for our community, to the whole world, or the oppression will continue.
Unfortunately I don’t think it will change anything! When I have explained what the CDC found last year to guys online some have said cool, but others have told me that I was only saying that because I wanted to spread HIV and they didn’t want to have anything to do with me! So if you think that ignorance and hate about HIV are only from straight people, I have to say you got that all wrong!
Until they actually address the fact that the viral load is higher in the gut, semen, the brain etc, Im not going to believe this study. Just because the virus is undetectable in the blood doesn’t mean the same in the other areas. How many people are getting their semen or anal secretions tested???? My guess is the percentages are extremely low.
My concern is that PARTNER 1&2 weren’t long enough to conclude no transmission. They more correctly concluded “no detectable transmission”. Just like the announcements of children who were “virtually cured” we could very easily have transmission occurring that because of an extremely low viral count remain undetectable for several years. We could realize several years down the line that transmission did in fact occur, but was undetectable (given the low average follow up of <2 Years). We don’t know what we don’t know.
Gee, I think I’ll just rush out and have unprotected anal sex and bottom for the first 25 guys that tell me they’re poz and undetectable. Or maybe not….
Nope – still refuse to believe so –
I have been an HIV poz undetectable professional guy for 4 yrs now. Healthy as ever and planning to live a long fun filled life. This is awesome news, but the stigma will always be there, or at least here in the rural Midwest. Some get it and some just won’t touch you. That’s OK, because it helps me to thin the heard of the people that I want in my life. But, always be safe from the other STD’s that can deplete what you just gained.
Positive undetectable is a medical diagnosis. I won’t know if a guy who claims that really is pos undetectable or not. Another way to lie like the guys who claim negative when they’re not. For the study to say they won’t transmit it even through unprotected sex is irresponsible. It’s like encouraging unprotected sex.
Exciting evidence which will fall on deaf ears. We are in an era where the social and psychological dangers of HIV are outpacing the physiologic. There is no greater evidence of this than witnessing gay men who are on PREP refusing to date or have sex with HIV positive/undetectable men. God helps us when it comes to the straight population……
If/when a cure is ever found, I guarantee these same idiots are going to poo-poo that finding as well. There is no remedy for stupid and stubborn.
Sorry but no: “Undetectable” means just that, not “non-existant;” if the virus is present, there’s a POSSIBILITY of transmission.
Same fallacy with PrEP; details of condom use, etc. always seem to get left out of reports on efficacy.
Blogs are someone’s opinion; get the facts (76K case is alot … but not enough with no details are cited).
the worst part of having hiv is the way the other gays guys treat you…. its not the shame of contracting it nor telling your mom, or coming to the realization that you have contracted what once was an extremely scary fatal disease, or your straight friends looking at you like you gonna drop dead on them at any moment …. all of that was easy peasy, what really drives the knife in is the constant rejection at the last minute right before hooking up after you get all riled up , exchange addresses. the fact that you been chatting with this hot guy who seems hella cool after you go into detail about what your going to do to each other and then the inevitable…………. “are you clean?”
im like “i shower everyday b**** what?? actually if your referring to my status; first off RUDE! and second, but actually undetectable here” then hes like
“sorry man, i cant, (insert lame uneducated fear based excuse here)” and then im all
“well shouldnt you be treating EVERYONE whom you have sex with as if they have it? doi! if not see you at the clinic soon enough…. oh and heres a tip…. your prolly NOT gonna het HIV from a guy that tells you they have it fool…..chew on that” ive had that exact conversation TOO MANY TIMES TO COUNT
this is refreshing i can just save this link and cut and paste it and send it to them….. neg gay guys can be so ignorant and shady….. jusst sayin
B4 1998 it was whats ur t-cells
Now its what ur viral load?
T-cells = whether you are HIV+ and when your CD4 cell count drops below 200 = full blown AIDS.
Viral load only tells you if the latest technology can DETECT HIV in the individual, the lower the load the less likely transmission … but STILL possible.
That is great news but the criminal pharm companies will make this drug extremely expensive and the criminal insurance companies will not have any coverage for it. Guaranteed. We need reform against both insurance and pharm companies.
the results of this “scientific” study are probably politically motivated (like many in mainstream science) and anything that is going to “prove” that HIV is no longer a real danger is very PC and within the expected and accepted guidelines of the modern gay agenda….
Great news, we need to get to the bottom of the truth
The studies had the name “Partner” for a reason. Although ethically, researchers could not solicit people to have sex with people with undetectable viral loads, they could follow existing couples where the incentive partner was on medicine and undetectable. This isn’t a matter of, not in the blood doesn’t mean not in the semen. That concern was the very reason to have this study.
These are not doctors theorizing. This is In Vivo, in life, actually tested in real people, with real results. And I remind you that the preventive test for HIV infection measures antibodies, but the test for those in treatment actually assays copies in the blood stream. And its floor is about 1/10th the preventive test.
Next, the reason treated virus can drop it’s numbers is, the medication damages the RNA, so any cells that managed to replicate would be incapable of producing viable copies, so they die out. As for the concern with cells living in the testes for years, that is about the same as the fact that herpes virus lives in a large number of people who do not know they have it, and who never become infectious.
I recall a physician saying, the desire for safe sex is not so to keep you from spreading what actually isn’t viable, it is to protect the patient’s damaged immune system from guys who don’t realize they have STI’s. The HIV patient gets tested for everything at least annually.
So the nay-sayers need to realize, doctors are not theorizing. They followed people for years, and at least one test can pick up exposure in under 30 days, not the 6 months of the earliest antibody test. The people who want to be cynical based on the terror campaign of the early years of this illness, owe humanity a bit more consideration. They used to think epilepsy was the work if witches. If you choose to use 3 condoms, have at it. But realize your continued negativity to pop people degrades their morale and immunity too. Ask your shrink. He’ll tell you.
Totally agree with you, RL! Very well said. Thanks!!
The study claims to have rigorously studied 76,000 cases where a POZ undetectable man injected his semen into the rectum of an HIV negative man, and the HIV negative man remained HIV negative?
It seems mind-boggling that POZ undetectable top men and HIV negative bottom men are (1) knowingly and voluntarily engaging in unprotected anal sex, (2) that they are voluntarily revealing their activity to those conducting the study, and (3) that the status of the HIV negative man is then being rigorously studied scientifically.
The number of skeptical comments is interesting. As with other incurable viruses, the commenters hope the study results are true, but are not willing to risk their health based on the findings.
The fact that hiv may still be present in the testes does not change the value of this study.
It says that “hiv undetectable persons did not transmit the disease” .
Whether or not hiv is hiding in their testicles does not change the outcome of the study. I’m sure many of the test subjects had the virus in their testes.
If you don’t want to believe it that’s your prerogative ; but don’t try to diss the study with an argument that doesn’t hold water.
Let those of us who can read and understand make our own decisions…
As long as there is money (billions of $) to be made by the big pharmaceutical companies that sell all kinds of meds to help keep HIV at bay, I doubt there will ever truly be a cure.
Garbage reporting for all the reasons everyone has cited above already.
Unprotected sex is bad. We shouldn’t be doing it, ever, for any reason.
We also shouldn’t be sleeping with people we just met and know nothing about.
We also probably shouldn’t be doing it in the butt at all, as numerous recent studies on the relationship between anal sex and prostate cancer/incontinence have been inconclusive, at best.
Pleasure ain’t worth your health or wearing a diaper, folks.
Interesting read. The article states “We looked so hard for transmission” Allison Rodgers told aidsmap.com “And we didn´t find any”. I might suggest that they look at the data of the 189 couples removed.
The study threw out too many results: The study started with 972 gay serodiscordant condomless couples but only counted 783 couples. It removed 189 (19%) because either the HIV+ partner did not maintain a viral load under 200 copies/ml or the HIV- partner used PReP or PEP. (was the PEP or PrEP use required by the rise in viral load?) There were 15 new HIV infectionsfrom a source different than the HIV+ partner. The removal of couples whose HIV+partner whose viral load rose to detectable levels was a disservice. This sounds like a drug company funding request to hide the fact that undetectable does not last in about 19% of the patients putting at least one partner at risk of infection.
Bottomline: A years worth of condoms cost about $12 and have no side effects. I will keep using condoms until a vaccine is found.