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<p>As part of the HIV Action Plan, NHS England made an initial £20 million available
over three years up to 2025 for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) opt-out testing
in 34 emergency departments in areas with extremely high HIV prevalence, with five
or more HIV cases per 1,000 residents aged 15 to 59 years old. This includes Blackpool
at 4.9 HIV cases in 2019, and the whole of London, including some local areas with
high HIV prevalence, specifically with two to five HIV cases per 1,000 residents aged
15 to 59 years old, with additional funding from NHS London.</p><p>The programme shows
extremely encouraging outcomes and in the first two years, it has preliminarily delivered
nearly 1.9 million HIV tests, and helped find more than 1,000 people with undiagnosed
or untreated HIV.</p><p>In November 2023, the Department announced a new research
project to evaluate an expansion of HIV opt-out testing in emergency departments in
England. Backed by a further £20 million of funding from the National Institute for
Health and Care Research, the research project will evaluate the testing programme
in 47 new sites across England, where HIV prevalence is high. The research project
is currently in its set-up phase and will run until the end of 2025/26, with sites
receiving twelve months of funding for testing.</p><p>Decisions on whether to continue
offering opt-out HIV testing in emergency departments in local areas with extremely
high and high HIV prevalence will be based on outcomes of the current opt-out HIV
testing programme and research project, as well as available funding.</p>
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