“Thanks to the laboratory test without a prescription, we can detect HIV without complicating our lives. » This is one of the messages that will soon be plastered in the metro, but also in the streets of the capital and the various municipalities of Seine-Saint-Denis. As of November 29, the Paris Sans Sida association, the City of Paris, the department of Seine-Saint-Denis and Health Insurance 75 and 93 are launching a three-week awareness campaign in the two most affected departments in France by the virus.
“The message is clear: it is zero infections, zero deaths and zero discrimination,” insists Anne-Claire Boux, deputy (EELV) to the mayor of Paris in charge of health. With a numerical objective in mind: “achieve zero contamination by 2030”.
PrEP, a treatment that is still too little known
In 2020 as well as in 2021, around 5,000 people were diagnosed with HIV, including 40% in Île-de-France. But Christophe Martet, president of Paris Without AIDS, is convinced: “The end of the epidemic is possible. Since HIV was first identified forty years ago, there has been enormous progress in prevention and treatment. » And “the means to exterminate HIV exist”, adds France Lert, epidemiologist and honorary president of the association.
Starting with PrEP, an oral medication prescribed since 2016 in France which helps prevent HIV contamination in the event of risky sexual relations. “Before there was only the condom,” explains France Lert. PrEP is a revolution. » This new weapon could prove particularly valuable for women. “30% of new infections concern them,” says Victoria Manda, infectious disease specialist at Saint-Louis hospital (Paris, 10th). These are contaminations which often take place in contexts of sexual violence and/or paid relationships where condoms cannot be imposed. However, since 2016, only 4% of PrEP prescriptions have been given to women. »
The existence of this preventive treatment remains largely unknown to the general public. In an Ifop survey commissioned by Paris without AIDS, 69% of the Ile-de-France residents questioned said they did not know what this medication was. “Despite notable progress in the fight against HIV, the public retains a fairly obsolete image,” confirms Élodie Aïna, the director of this association.
Removing prejudices and becoming better informed
Another example: the anonymous, free and non-prescription screening tests that can be carried out in all medical analysis laboratories since 2022. However, 49% of Île-de-France residents surveyed do not know that this ‘is possible.
The campaign deployed in the coming days will therefore aim to advance knowledge but also to remove prejudices. “Thanks to treatments, we can share someone’s life but not their HIV”, recalls for example one of the posters, specifying just below that “the treatments allow an HIV-positive person to not transmit HIV to their loved ones. sexual partners. Medical monitoring which also allows “to give life without giving HIV”, as another poster indicates.
Messages aimed at the most affected populations will also be broadcast to Afro hairdressers, for example, or on homosexual dating applications. To this will be added a guide which will be distributed to general practitioners in Paris and Seine-Saint-Denis in order to make them aware of the prescription of PrEP. “It must be available to all women,” repeats Victoria Manda. Not as an additional injunction, but so that they can take charge of their sexual health. »
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