There is no shot to prevent HIV, only condoms or a daily pill
The old claim turned out to be wrong and was rejected by evidence.
TaughtThere is no HIV vaccine and no long-lasting way to prevent infection. Prevention comes down to condoms or, more recently, a pill taken every single day without fail.
NowIn June 2025 the FDA approved lenacapavir (Yeztugo), an injection given just twice a year that prevented HIV in essentially everyone who received it in trials, close to 100% effective.
What actually happened
Daily-pill PrEP, available since 2012, works only if taken every day, and in practice adherence is where prevention fails. A vaccine has never materialized despite forty years of effort. So "prevention means a daily pill" was an honest statement of the art.
Lenacapavir is a long-acting antiviral injected under the skin every six months. In the PURPOSE 1 trial there were zero infections among more than 2,000 women; in PURPOSE 2, two among more than 2,000 men and gender-diverse participants, better than the daily pill in both. The FDA approved it for prevention in June 2025, and the journal Science had named the earlier trial data its Breakthrough of the Year.
It is not a vaccine and it is not a cure, and cost and access will decide how much it matters globally. But the specific thing you were taught, that stopping HIV demands vigilance every single day, stopped being true. Twice a year is now enough.
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Sources
Who was taught this
Still standard through 2025, so anyone who finished school between 1950 and 2025 learned the earlier version.