D3 (PENTA 21)

HIV infection implies taking medicines for life. Therefore, it is important that they not only work well, but also that they continue to be safe, with a low chance of long-term side effects, and that they are easy to take every day. Anti-HIV treatment using two medicines instead of three may be one way of achieving this. The D3 study aimed to find out whether treating children and young people living with HIV with two anti‑HIV medicines, dolutegravir (DTG) and lamivudine (3TC), is safe and as effective as the three-medicine anti-HIV treatments currently used in routine practice.

The D3 Youth Trials Board, a group of young people living with HIV, collaborated with a designer to create a fun, engaging poster for their peers participating in the trial. View the D3 poster co-designed by the Youth Trials Board.

The D3 study is sponsored by the Penta Foundation.

The D3 trial results were presented at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) in February 2026. See the link to the news article here: https://www.innovative-ctu.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-stories/2026/february/two-medicines-are-as-good-as-current-three-medicine-combinations-to-treat-children-living-with-hiv/https://penta-id.org/publications/dtg-3tc-is-non-inferior-to-dtg-based-3-drug-art-in-children-with-hiv-d3-penta-21-week-96-results/

The slides presented at CROI 2026 can be accessed here: DTG/3TC is non-inferior to DTG-based 3-drug ART in children with HIV: D3/Penta 21 week-96 results | Penta