Today’s announcement at the International AIDS Conference in Vienna, Austria, about a breakthrough in microbicide development is reason to celebrate. While it is too early to declare mission accomplished--we are still years away from actually having an effective microbicide--a few hugs and kisses with a little patting of the back might very well be called for. We now have real reason to believe that within a reasonable period of time--one of the study author claims within a few years--women will have an easy method of protecting themselves against HIV that they can control and their partners may not even need to know about.

Reporting from Vienna journalist Linda Villarosa writes about this incredible scientific advance, while Tomika Anderson shares her exclusive Q&A with the study's authors, South African epidemiologists Quarraisha and Salim S. Abdool Karim.

Also in this issue, 14-year-old youth reporter Kali Villarosa offers her observations at her first International AIDS Conference. And Angela Bronner Helm writes about the conference's magical Global Village.

Yours in the struggle,

Phill