HIV prevention activities aiming to reduce incidence could be targeted more effectively and efficiently if a quick, easy, valid, and precise method of estimating incidence in populations were available. These are the conclusions of a group of international experts convened to discuss the challenges and progress in the field, with the aim of stimulating new investment in technologies for identifying recent HIV infections.

To tackle the challenges—which include technical and market-related issues—and move towards the goal of having a thoroughly validated incidence assay, the expert Incidence Assay Critical Path Working Group (funded in part by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation) charted the activities, milestones, and decisions that will be required in the coming years.