New figures published by Public Health England this week have shown the Break the Chain campaign to be a success – finding 39 new HIV diagnosis and 109 people with syphilis.
In June, July and August 2020, Terrence Higgins Trust (THT) and 56 Dean Street ran a ‘Break the Chain’ campaign involving a wide-scale push on online HIV testing when a vast majority of people (84%) were abstaining from sex outside their immediate household because of the Covid-19 lockdown.
The results show a higher than average test positivity rate – 0.7%, compared to the 0.5% test positivity rate from online testing initiatives in 2019.
Dr Michael Brady, Medical Director at THT, said: “Everyone should know their HIV status – online testing makes it easy and it can be.