People taking the pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) HIV-prevention pill Truvada (tenofovir/emtricitabine) should proceed with caution as a second man has been infected by a rare strain of the virus while on the medication.
Truvada offers 99 percent protection from contracting HIV when the pills are taken daily. The patient’s hair and blood tests showed the appropriate levels for the pill, according to Buzzfeed.com.
He isn’t releasing his identity as a privacy measure. But the patient is a gay man who has a long-term partner that is HIV-positive. His partner is on medication and has an undetectable viral load in his body.
The patient’s test results were released at the 2016 HIV Research for Prevention conference in Chicago in October.
This is the second documented case involving infection while on daily Truvada. The first case was announced in February, according to Buzzfeed.com.
“We know PrEP is not 100 percent effective, and that’s something we need to be saying loudly and clearly,” Mitchell Warren, executive director of AVAC, was quoted saying on Buzzfeed.com. “No prevention method – other than abstinence – is.”