Philip Carabot, Consultant Genito-Urinary Physician, St James Hospital, Malta

Are we winning the battle against the STIs? It may appear so, with some success in the implementation of the UNIDS 2014 programme 90-90-90, at least in some countries but not in all Eastern Europe and Central Asia in particular. The overall rate of other STIs keeps increasing, syphilis amongst MSM in particular. The introduction of PREP is hailed as a huge milestone, but at what cost? Gonorrhoea is becoming practically untreatable in many parts of the world with few viable new antibiotics in sight. Apart from the undoubted success of the Hepatitis B and HPV vaccines, there have been no major advances in the search for vaccines against other infections. Are we winning?