What is PrEP?

Pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, is a medication taken by individuals who aren’t living with HIV to significantly reduce their risk of acquiring HIV. Despite its high effectiveness (over 99% effective at preventing HIV), PrEP remains underutilised, particularly among women at risk and is commonly seen as only for gay men.

While the UK has made progress in combating HIV, new diagnoses continue to rise, with a notable increase among heterosexual women. This trend underscores the need for increased awareness and access to PrEP with many women remain unaware of PrEP or its benefits, leaving them vulnerable to HIV infection. As a member of the Fast-Track Cities network, Liverpool has achieved substantial progress in HIV prevention and treatment, the city’s commitment to ending new HIV cases by 2030 necessitates a concerted effort to increase PrEP awareness and accessibility, especially among women.

Barriers for women and PrEP

Dr David Rook, a specialty registrar at Axess Sexual Health, Liverpool, states that one of the biggest barriers to women using PrEP is awareness:

“Many women at risk of HIV do not realise they are at risk, and therefore don’t think PrEP is relevant to them. Furthermore, very few of the original PrEP research studies involved women, so less was initially known about how PrEP works for this group.”

Negative stereotypes and stigma also prevent women from engaging with sexual health services, new and empowering campaigns will support the encouragement of more women into HIV prevention, such as The EmpowHERment Campaign. This campaign intends to make women more informed about PrEP and how it could benefit them. You can find more about this campaign here.