On February 18, 2023, the Office of AIDS Research (OAR) and Office of Research on Women’s Health (ORWH) co-sponsored the NIH OAR-ORWH Women & HIV Symposium: Considerations from Across the Lifespan during the 13th International Workshop on HIV & Women 2023 in Seattle, Washington.

The symposium served as the public launch of a new joint program between OAR and ORWH that aims to achieve the NIH vision for women’s health, in which all women, including cisgender women, transgender women, and individuals assigned female at birth, receive evidence-based HIV care, prevention, and treatment tailored to their own needs, circumstances, and goals. The program also will support women in science careers to reach their full professional potential.

Despite tremendous advances in HIV and AIDS research over the last 40 years, women—particularly women of color, young women, and transgender women—remain disproportionately affected by the HIV pandemic. An intersectional, equity-informed, data-driven approach to research on HIV and women is the cornerstone of our new collaboration. We were thrilled to introduce this program through a symposium that highlighted innovative, multidisciplinary research to address the health of women with or affected by HIV. We invited six panelists who presented in pairs—an early career investigator and an established researcher—with each pair highlighting scientific opportunities across three topical areas.

Read the joint blog from OAR and ORWH Directors.