City of St. Louis Department of Health Recognizes PrEP Week, U.S Department of Health Program: Ending the HIV Epidemic (EHE)

The City of St. Louis Department of Health and its community partners will feature the region’s first annual Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) Awareness Week through social media channels starting next week. The campaign, organized through the Department of Health’s Ending the HIV Epidemic program, will raise awareness and understanding of using PrEP to prevent HIV and how to access this innovative treatment. 

PrEP is a daily medicine to prevent a person not living with HIV from contracting the virus. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states PrEP is highly effective for preventing HIV when taken as prescribed. PrEP reduces the risk of getting HIV from sex by about 99%, and it reduces the risk of HIV from injection drug use by at least 74%. 

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services launched the Ending the HIV Epidemic initiative (EHE) in 2019, aiming to reduce new HIV infections in the U.S. by 90% by 2030. In addition to scaling up key HIV prevention and treatment strategies, the initiative encourages disruptive innovation to lift the burden of HIV in the United States.

The Department of Health continuously examines its response to HIV and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) across the region. It works to expand access to testing, link persons living with HIV to care services and scale up proven prevention interventions and strategies, such as PrEP. 

This year’s PrEP Awareness Week runs October 23-29. Increasing awareness and providers’ knowledge about PrEP will support increased treatment use across our communities, as well as encourage everyone to take advantage of the free testing and educational resources available to take steps to know your health status.

If you or someone you know needs a free HIV test, please visit gettested.cdc.gov to find a testing location. You can also test at home through the Department of Health’s Take Me Home program.