Despite setbacks, HIV can be beaten

tribute to human ingenuity and determination that no longer makes headlines. That is because , the virus which causes it, is on the run. According to the latest update by , the programme that keeps tabs on such matters, deaths from -related illnesses have been falling since 2004 and new infections since 1996. Indeed, the fact that the number of people living with the virus (currently about 38m) continues to rise is actually good news. It means they are being kept alive by antiretroviral drug therapy (), rather than dropping out of the statistics by dying. But still kills in numbers that would never be off the front pages if a war, rather than a virus, were the cause. So far, it has ended the lives of some 40m people, with 650,000 of those deaths having happened in 2021.There is, moreover, a feeling of nervousness among doctors and activists alike. Funding directed at the problem in poor and middle-income countries has shrunk since 2018. And the year-on-year fall in new infections in 2021 was the smallest since 2016. This may be a blip. Covid-19 has changed immediate medical priorities in many countries, to the detriment of control. But if blip turns to slide, things could go wrong quite fast in some places, particularly in Africa.