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Comment by vfclists | Hacker News Reader

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I read that as cisgendered && (women || adolescent girls) && (16 <= age <= 25). Basically 'cisgendered' and the age range are describing all study participants which which are all either women or adolescent girls which makes sense to me based on how I believe these trials are generally constructed.

Very often "women" and "men" in medicine refers to adults, i.e., 18+.

Likewise, we use the term "girl's/boy's" tennis in high school but "women's/men's tennis" in college because most people in high school are under 18 even though they are "women" and "men" in many relevant senses.

The term matters to the study, because they were interested in a comparable group of women. I don't expect HRT is realistically available in that area, so they're just reporting that they didn't need to deal with that complication.

Well HIV is most common amongst homosexual populations, so it is just clarifying that they gave the drug to straight girls in the first trial.

This prevalence is true in the US (and most Western countries I think, though not as certain), is definitely not true in Sub-Saharan Africa (where 75% of the world's HIV+ population lives). Women and girls are more likely to have it in Sub-Saharan Africa. See https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10126805/ estimates that over 60% of all new infections in SSA are in women. Parts of that region the HIV+ prevalence rate is above 5%. That is why they are focused on testing that population in that region, they are the most at risk.

60% of new infections are women, yet they had a completely women-only trial?

For the existing HIV-preventing medications we have, such as PrEP, the treatments are much more effective in men than women. It can easily take a month for PrEP to be effective in Assigned Female At Birth folks, but I saw studies during the COVID era that a few days were plenty for Assigned Male At Birth folks. There's some logic to focusing on the cohort that usually has the lowest success rate with these kinds of medication.

The difference in efficacy has to do with the way the body is designed to absorb fluids, and its one of the few areas where hormones and surgery don't make a difference. (A trans guy on HRT with a full set of surgeries generally has male chances of cardiovascular issues, male levels of calorie consumption/muscle-building, etc.)

Cisgender doesn't mean straight. They may be homosexual, just not trans.

I see, so you're saying that "cisgender female" means Female As Identified at Birth, but includes both trans and not trans groups regardless? Thus, "cisgender female" includes both homosexuals and non-homosexuals (and non-binary etc), but actually some from this group may presently identify as male? I did not know this.

A bit simpler: cisgender means same/matching gender, basically the opposite of trans-gender. If the gender you identify as is the one matching your birth sex default, you're cisgender.

But it's completely separate from your attraction to other people, so straight, gay, anything is fine in either category.

It says cisgendered, not straight, though.

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