Lab data is going to be key in the next phase of HIV epidemic management. As more countries stabilise the number of patients on treatment, and mature the support services around them, the wealth of epidemiological value in their national lab data set increases.

One such example is detecting HIV transmission routes of exposed babies in South Africa.

Palindrome Data partnered with the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), a division of the National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS), and Boston University (BU) to leverage the vast historical lab data set to understand what data methods are helpful on such a large set and how to help identify and excavate the key meaningful patterns.

With existing query-based diagnostic reporting at scale, we can only tell that a child has become positive, not HOW and WHEN the infection occurred.

This work is thinking about vertical transmission and the next generation of HIV exposed infants. The World Health Organization (WHO) and the South African government have guidelines around exclusive breastfeeding in virally suppressed mothers to reduce HIV transmission risk for exposed babies.