​The Legacy Project Strategy

While the focus of the HVTN supported Legacy Project has been on vaccine trials, community commitment to fighting a virus is not limited to supporting only one research agenda. Building on the success of the HVTN Legacy Project and broadening the focus to all the Division of AIDS (DAIDS)-funded HIV clinical trials networks are currently conducting trials in which enrollment of representative numbers of people of color is critical. Additionally, due to the changing demographics of the HIV epidemic in the United States, it is more important than ever to enroll representative populations in therapeutic trials as well. Additionally, future prevention trials will likely incorporate multiple biomedical interventions involving more than one network, including microbicides, PREP, vaccines, and/or behavioral interventions. Building on the success of the HVTN Legacy Project and broadening the focus to all the DAIDS-funded HIV clinical trials networks would amplify the reach and efficacy of the Legacy Project.

More information

About Legacy​

African American and Hispanic women are 25 times and six times more likely to contract HIV, respectively, than their White counterparts. Fifty percent of new HIV diagnoses in the U.S. occur in our Black population. Gay men and other men who have sex with men still have the highest rate of new infections and almost 50% of those new infections occur among Black gay men and other Black men who have sex with men. This alarming disparate impact of the HIV epidemic in the U.S. highlights the need for accurate information, building relationships of trust, and joining in dialog and partnership with the most impacted communities and researchers as a prerequisite to attaining full representation of the communities most adversely impacted by the HIV epidemic in HIV clinical research programs. Only then will the results of those research efforts be fully applicable to the communities most impacted by the HIV epidemic.