The number of gay and bisexual men diagnosed with HIV has fallen by more than a fifth.

New figures show a 21% fall in new HIV infections among men who have sex with men (MSM) from 3,750 during 2015, to 2,810 in 2016. Public Health England say the fall “represents the most exciting development in the UK HIV epidemic in 20 years”.

Among the general UK population, new infections have fallen by 18% from 6,286 in 2015 to 5,164 in 2016. Health bosses credit access to PrEP, a daily HIV-prevention pill, with the fall, and say the trend “will be further strengthened with the implementation of the PrEP Impact Trial over the next three years.”

The number of gay and bi men accessing sexual health clinics has also risen from from 37,224 in 2007 to 143,560 in 2016. An NHS England spokesperson said: “The new figures out today show that NHS investment in HIV prevention is paying off.

“High rates of effective treatment in people with diagnosed HIV, our Treatment as Prevention policy which ensures that people receive treatment to protect HIV negative partners and our major intervention with PrEP, which will be up and running by the end of this month, will supercharge these increasingly successful efforts to prevent HIV.”