The Person-Centred HIV Research Team (PeCHIVReT), based at the Department of Clinical Pharmacy and Pharmacy Management, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, has drawn international attention at the world’s largest scientific gathering on HIV by demonstrating that prevention education may be more effective through play than through lectures.

The team hosted a global village session titled “Play to Prevent: Gamified HIV Prevention Learning Led by Youth and Communities,” held on 30 July during the 26th International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2026) in Rio de Janeiro, which ran from 26 to 31 July 2026. It was led by Dr. AbdulMuminu Isah, PeCHIVReT’s Principal Investigator, as lead convener, researchers Eziwanne Ugochukwu and Gabriel Ezenri as co-organizers and Professor Christian Ezeibe, Dean of Student Affairs at the University of Nigeria, as the session chairman, where he remarked that the global action on the HIV response cannot be won in the lecture hall but rather in the communities and by the youth at the heart of it.

Decades of experience show that simply giving people information rarely changes behaviour. PeCHIVReT’s model instead has young people reason through realistic prevention dilemmas using gamification, from misconceptions about pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to acting within the critical 72-hour window after a possible exposure. Because the approach is low-cost, culturally adaptable and youth-led, it can be replicated in schools, clinics and community organisations across low-resource settings.

The session drew on a range of expert voices. Youth HIV advocate Tiffany Nwanne opened the programme, arguing that young people should be treated as architects of prevention rather than passive audiences, and that youth-led approaches build trust and create safer spaces for conversations about testing and prevention. Consultant HIV pharmacist Dr. Olusegun Funsho Omotola spoke on the art within the science of HIV prevention, describing how combining scientific accuracy with cultural and creative methods improves how well prevention messages are understood and retained. Professor Chukwuemeka Ubaka, a specialist in medical education, addressed how gamification shifts learning from passive absorption to active problem-solving, and led the interactive game rounds in which participants worked through real-world prevention scenarios.

Convened by the International AIDS Society since 1985, the International AIDS Conference is widely regarded as the largest gathering on HIV and AIDS and among the largest on any global health issue, drawing delegates from more than 130 countries, with its programme selected through international scientific review.

PeCHIVReT is a research team at the University of Nigeria, led by AbdulMuminu Isah and Gabriel Ezenri, that draws members from several continents and focuses on person-centered HIV care.