Antiretroviral treatment in low-resource settings: what has changed in the last 10 years and what needs to change in the coming years?

In the past decade, access to antiretroviral therapy (ART) has witnessed a rapid scale-up. This has been made possible by significant donor funding, price reductions facilitated by flexible trade agreements and the standardization of antiretroviral prescription. Currently the global HIV community stands on the cusp of a new chapter in HIV care, that of initiating ART even earlier in the course of the infection, possibly as pre-exposure prophylaxis, or as part of a 'test-and-treat' approach. In this article, the authors provide an overview of the significant advances made in improving access to antiretrovirals in low-resource settings, as well as the challenges facing new approaches to ART in the next decade.