5th IAS conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention: Impact Report

Attracting more than 5,800 participants from 123 countries, the 5th IAS Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and Prevention (IAS 2009), held from 19 to 22 July 2009 in Cape Town, South Africa, offered more than 1,550 reports on original research in four areas : Basic Sciences (Track A), Clinical Sciences (Track B), Biomedical Prevention (Track C), and - new at this meeting -Operations Research (Track D). The 59 sessions included 12 plenary addresses by leaders from every sector of HIV research. The conference was particularly rich in research that may affect the path of the epidemic in low- and middle-income countries, policy-shaping and practiceshaping developments from high-income countries were hardly ignored.

Consistent with the focus of the pathogenesis conference series, this report aims not only to highlight particularly important original research and other developments detailed at IAS 2009, but also to analyze their potential impact on policy and practice in the coming years for those working in HIV or related fields. Throughout the conference and in the closing session, four teams of rapporteurs summarized all oral and many poster presentations, and discussed their relevance in the context of ongoing research. This review of all four conference tracks draws upon these rapporteur summaries, outlines important findings from additional studies, and where relevant, outlines other recently published scientific literature. The report includes abstract numbers of cited presentations linked to online files of slides, posters or abstracts, as available. A full abstract search of IAS 2009 and earlier IAS conferences is available on the IAS website at www.iasociety.org.

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