A recent study revealed that tests for a new treatment aimed at providing immunity across various strains of the HIV virus were successful in producing an anti-HIV immune system response. Scientists are cautiously optimistic that the tests could lead to a HIV vaccine. 

This is the latest armory in the fight against a virus that has caused years of discrimination and stigma against minority groups as well as millions of deaths worldwide. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), since the beginning of the HIV epidemic, more than 70 million people have been infected with the virus and about 35 million have died. This peaked in 1995, when complications from AIDS were the leading cause of death for adults between 25-44 years of age. Since then the fight has seen great advances, leading to an 80 percent reduction in death rates. Although we haven’t discovered a vaccine yet, we have come a long way.