The current path of HIV prevention and treatment in lower and middle income countries will result in a continued pandemic in 2031, the 50th anniversary of the recognition of the virus.

Costs will have escalated to $35bn (£21bn; €23bn), more than three times current expenditures, and more than a million people will continue to be infected each year.

These are the key findings of the AIDS 2031 Project (www.aids2031.org), a consortium of organisations involved with the pandemic. The project has modelled current and alternative activities, seeking to determine “what can we do to move the epidemic in the most positive direction possible,” Robert Hecht, told a news conference in Washington, …