Community, Connection, and Sharing the Science at CROI 2025

The 2025 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) took place March 9 to 12 in San Francisco. Coverage included the latest developments in the HIV space for young and older patients—clinical trial developments, the newest drug data, and community-based research—but also how social determinants affect care outcomes, the growing importance of knowledge of menopause and chronic disease, maternal health, ongoing challenges of long Covid, and more

Experts share what they take away from CROI each year and why this meeting is so important in this space. Please also revisit their interviews from the conference:

• Annie Antar, MD, PhD, Johns Hopkins Medicine: CROI to Present New Insights on Long COVID Risk, HIV Cure
• Lynae Darbes, PhD, University of Michigan School of Nursing: Couples Counseling Key to HIV Prevention and Maternal Care
• Katrina Ortblad, ScD, MPH, Fred Hutch Cancer Center: Bridging Gaps in HIV Care Through Pharmacy-Based Solutions
• Bridgette J. Picou, LVN, ACLPN, The Well Project: Why a Holistic Approach to HIV and Menopause Matters
• Priscilla Tsondai, MD, MPH, International AIDS Society/CIPHER:
  • Addressing and Improving Gaps in HIV Care for Children and Adolescents
  • Priorities for Optimizing HIV Care in Children and Adolescents

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity; captions were auto-generated.

Transcript

What makes CROI such a valuable meeting to attend?

Antar: I think CROI is really special. It brings together clinicians, people living in the community with HIV, HIV activists, basic scientists, translational scientists, industry scientists, all government scientists, all together. It's really meant for there to be a lot of cross-pollination, for the basic scientists to hear what's exciting about clinical work, and for translational people to hear the public health work that's being done. They really try to bring everyone together and have everyone hear what's going on.

I think everyone leaves with this renewed sense of purpose, this feeling that, “I'm working to end the HIV epidemic in my field, in my way, but I know that there's thousands of people out there who are working on slightly different angles, but we're all working toward the same goal.” And it's exciting to see everyone in the room together. I also want to give a shout-out: there's not just HIV, there's TB [tuberculosis], hepatitis B, hepatitis C, SARS-CoV2-3, and others. It's great to have everyone in the room.

Darbes: I think for behavioral scientists like myself, I think it's a really nice opportunity for the more biomedically focused people, who are much more kind of the hardcore immunologists or virologists, to really hear from people like me to say, “Here's how people in rural Kenya can achieve viral suppression. These are their lives, and this is how we can kind of engage our partners and our families to achieve these outcomes that the virologists and immunologists want us to, and infectious disease physicians want us to, achieve."

It's also that multidisciplinary setting, where we're all kind of hearing about that other side. They’re hearing about the behavioral side; I'm hearing about the more promising drug strategies or the new modes of delivery, such as long-acting treatment, things like that. I think that we both benefit from hearing the other side of the coin, with behavioral vs biomedical. I think that's why I continue to come. Also just the general networking—not above and beyond what we're hearing about in the scientific developments—but coming together as a community, I think, is really invaluable.

Ortblad: I think the community that it brings together, which elicits such exciting discourse about the latest ideas that are happening in the field. [It] really brings also together, especially in this moment of community, people that really care and are passionate and really want to make the world a better, happier, healthier place, so that people can fulfill their full potential. I think it's very inspiring and motivating. Sometimes academia can be isolating, and I think it's a reminder that you're part of this wonderful greater community, and it's very motivating to keep you carrying on.

Picou: CROI is one of the rare spaces where you can get people from everywhere in the world who are all working on the same problem, from so many different perspectives, to share their work. CROI, in itself, is a bridge of knowledge. It's a way to share information. It's a way to gain thoughts and ideas. I think people keep coming back because there is that opportunity to share all of this knowledge and to hear things from a different perspective—because sometimes a different perspective is all you need to crack the code on something that you're working on.

My hope is that there begins to be more of a bridge between science and community, so that we start to work together more and really understand: science needs the bodies, and the bodies need the science. Neither one can exist without the other, and so that’s part of the reason that I'm so excited to be a part of this panel this year, to be able to give community and lived experience, because I think people need to hear that. There's a humanity in both science and in communities that I think sometimes gets missed, and I want to be part of that connection.

Tsondai: I think compared to all the other HIV conferences, CROI has managed to really put, not only looking at the implementation—be it of strategies or approaches in the HIV response—but also there's a lot of science, a lot of basic science that's also included in the program. Which, for me, I'm a clinician by training—I'm not a basic scientist—so, when I come back here, I actually every time hear something new. Be it about the HIV virus itself, be it about the CD4 cells, be it about the human body, [or] immunology [and] vaccinology. We get to hear that more in a CROI meeting than in other HIV-related gatherings that happen throughout the year.

Also because it's very anchored in science, I think that's the other reason [why] people come back for more. Because this is where really the groundbreaking research—be it in the labs, be it in implementation in the field—is shared. And when you hear that, that's when sometimes you then can take what is being shared and go and try and unpack it a bit, generating more research questions that you can then move forward and advocate for.

I think CROI is really one of those meetings that I've attended where I've appreciated how much it's anchored in science, how much basic science is also really highlighted and showcased. But also keeping that implementation face to it and not losing touch [with] reality, even if you're really looking at science. There's a mix of that as well.