Pharmacies in a number of towns near Barcelona are to offer rapid HIV tests, the British Medical Journal reports. The tests will be available from early 2009 and will initially involve 35 pharmacies in a pilot project.
In common with many other European countries, Spain has a high rate of undiagnosed HIV infections. Late diagnosis of HIV is the underlying cause of a significant proportion of the HIV-related illness and death still seen in western European countries. Furthermore, there is growing evidence that many HIV transmissions originate in individuals who are unaware of their HIV status.
HIV testing in pharmacies will, it is hoped, reach individuals who are not accessing traditional health services that provide HIV testing.
The results of the rapid HIV tests will be available within 15 minutes. Any individual testing HIV-positive will be referred to hospital-based testing for a confirmatory test. The pharmacy tests are anonymous.
Target populations are injecting drug users and people who have had unprotected sex with multiple partners. The towns participating in the pilot have high levels of injecting drug use, being selected on the basis of the number of syringes dispensed by needle exchange programmes.
All the pharmacies offering rapid HIV tests have experience of working with injecting drug users as they participate in methadone maintenance and needle exchange schemes.
None of the towns where the pharmacy-based tests will be available have other sources of community-based HIV testing.
In the UK, Boots, a high-street pharmacist, offers chlamydia screening to 16 to 24 year olds, but no pharmacist offers HIV tests. HIV tests are available from NHS sexual and reproductive health services, GPs and some community-based organisations.