EasyTest 2023: San Raffaele hosts the appointment with the rapid, anonymous and free HIV test

World AIDS Day is celebrated on December 1st, with the aim of raising awareness among the population on the issue and promoting prevention behaviors that reduce the risk of transmission of the virus, such as periodically getting tested for HIV infection. Prevention, in fact, remains the main way to defeat the virus epidemic.

For this reason, Vita-Salute San Raffaele University and IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele are promoting two important initiatives that are free and open to the public for Friday, December 1st, 2023.

From 9 AM to 4 PM, an EASY-Test camper will host a team of doctors from the Infectious Diseases Unit together with Medici in Strada at the forecourt of IRCCS Ospedale San Raffaele, via Olgettina 60 - Milan. In the camper van equipped as an outpatient clinic, you can undergo the rapid test to detect the presence of HIV antibodies. The test uses capillary blood sampling (finger stick), requires just a few minutes and the result is available in a few seconds. The test will be carried out, guaranteeing anonymity, by medical staff, who will provide counseling on HIV and sexually transmitted infections.

The initiative is fully included among the Public Engagement activities to which the San Raffaele Campus has been dedicating itself for years with passion and enthusiasm, with a view to promoting health protection and prevention in society and in the territory, through opportunities for involvement and mutual learning between scientists and the public. Find out more

In the afternoon, from 2 to 6 PM, the Infectious Diseases Unit, directed by Professor Antonella Castagna, will organize the "HIV infection: no one left behind" symposium, to take stock of the progress of scientific research, to talk of the disease at a global level and to discuss the real needs of people living with HIV infection. The meeting, free and open to the public upon seats availability, will be held in the San Raffaele room, via Olgettina 60, Milan.

HIV infection is now kept under control by antiretroviral therapies, which have radically changed its prognosis, interrupting its evolution towards immunodeficiency and the clinical forms characterizing AIDS. Furthermore, the control of viral replication by therapy has represented an enormous achievement in terms of prevention, since people with HIV, on stable therapy and negative viremia, do not transmit the infection sexually.

“However, important milestones remain to be achieved, including equity of access to HIV screening test and therapy, issues related to chronic therapy uptake, and challenges related to finding a definitive cure for HIV infection”,

explains Professor Castagna.