Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Life support on HBO

Inspired by a true story, this HBO Films presentation uses a mix of actors and real people from the HIV/AIDS community to tell the story of an HIV-positive Brooklyn woman named Ana (Queen Latifah), who channels her energy and regret over past drug addiction into working for Life Support, an AIDS outreach group. When Kelly's HIV-infected gay friend Amare (Evan Ross) disappears, Ana, looking to connect with her daughter while helping a lost soul, throws herself into searching for him. She embarks on a dangerous but necessary journey, and as she seeks to save one life and heal another, Ana learns a poignant lesson about loving and letting go.

Premiere Saturday March 10 at 8PM. Click here to watch preview.

*********************************

About Life support in the Washington Times

"Black women are the No. 1 people getting [the disease], and I wanted to create a film that would give black women a voice," said Nelson George, producer and writer of "Life Support." The multigenerational story is based on Mr. George's real-life experiences with his sister, Andrea Williams. She is a recovering drug addict who has been living with the virus for a decade, and who became an activist in a community service organization in Brooklyn, N.Y., called Life Support.
This project began as a way to deal with "the fears my family had," Mr. George said. However, "She evolved and gained knowledge ... and what we thought was a negative thing that would destroy her and be tragic for us turned to a positive, and she became focused and centered, and this was good and inspirational."
Mr. George, along with actress Gloria Reuben, will attend at the D.C. screening of "Life Support" tonight sponsored by the National Cable & Telecommunications Association. It was released at the Sundance Film Festival in January and debuts March 10 on HBO.
"The purpose of this [film] is to reignite the dialogue about this virus," he said.
Walter Smith, executive director of D.C. Appleseed, which publishes a report card on the D.C. government's ability to deal with HIV/AIDS, spoke on the film. Though he has seen only trailers for "Life Support," Mr. Smith said that "the more that's out there [about HIV/AIDS] the more people will know. ... Leaders across the board have to speak out." In our past conversations, Mr. Smith often suggested that the biggest problem in eradicating HIV/AIDS is the community's unwillingness to talk about the disease.
"There has to be more frank, public talk about this issue at the highest levels," Mr. Smith said. "It's a sad situation. Some of it is so closeted that some people would rather die than get tested."

Read the article A breath of fresh dialogue in HIV/AIDS fight, by Adrienne Washington.

14th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections

From 26th February to 5th March 2007, aidsmap produces a daily email with the latest updates from the 14th Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI), which is being held in Los Angeles, USA.

To sign up and receive this daily email, click here and enter your details in the online form provided.

To find more information about the Conference, visit CROI 2007. Don't miss the webcast sessions!

New medications aid drug-resistant HIV patients

Source: Los Angeles Times

The findings bring "the opportunity for a new life," one doctor says.
By Jia-Rui Chong, Times Staff Writer

In what some are hailing as the most important development in HIV therapy in a decade, two new classes of drugs have been found to block virus replication in patients resistant to existing drugs, researchers said Tuesday.

The two new classes, called integrase inhibitors and CCR5 inhibitors, doubled the number of patients in a group of studies whose infections could be brought under control, researchers said at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

This is "a pivotal moment" for patients who have become resistant to most AIDS drugs, said Dr. Eric Daar, chief of HIV medicine at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Torrance. Daar, who was not involved in the research, estimated that about 20% of his patients are resistant to the existing classes of drugs.

Given the serious problems in treating drug-resistant patients, Daar said, the findings bring "the opportunity for a new life."

Dr. John Mellors, chief of infectious diseases at the University of Pittsburgh, said the new findings hearken back to the introduction in the 1990s of the powerful drugs that converted HIV infection from a mostly fatal disease to one that could be managed for long periods of time.

"This is really a remarkable development in the field," said Mellors, who was not involved in the studies.

Closest to federal approval is maraviroc, developed by Pfizer Inc. The drug binds to a receptor on the surface of human cells known as CCR5, preventing HIV from locking on and entering the cells.

Maraviroc represents the first class of HIV drugs to target the human immune system rather than the virus itself.

Other companies have attempted to bring out CCR5 inhibitors, but with little success. Trials with GlaxoSmithKline's candidate, aplaviroc, were halted in 2005 because the drug caused liver toxicity.

Dr. Howard Mayer of Pfizer reported on studies of maraviroc in 1,049 patients in 13 countries: 840 received the experimental drug in combination with their regular drug regimen, while the rest received a placebo and their regular drugs.

About 44% of the patients receiving maraviroc saw their blood HIV concentrations fall to undetectable levels after 24 weeks of therapy, Meyer said, compared with 23% of those receiving the placebo.

Experts think the drug could be approved by the Food and Drug Administration by the end of the year.

The second new drug is Merck & Co.'s raltegravir, formerly known as MK-0158. It blocks an HIV enzyme called integrase, one of three enzymes used by the virus to copy itself in immune cells.

Dr. David Cooper from the University of New South Wales in Australia and Dr. Roy Steigbigel from State University of New York at Stony Brook reported on two studies involving 699 patients, two-thirds of whom received raltegravir in addition to their regular HIV drugs. Both studies were funded by Merck.

About 62% of the patients receiving raltegravir saw the HIV in their blood fall to undetectable levels after 16 weeks, compared with 35% of those receiving the standard drugs alone, the researchers said.

The drug, which has been fast-tracked by the FDA, was well tolerated by patients.

Gilead Sciences Inc. also has an integrase inhibitor in earlier stages of testing and will present results today.

"The big question now is how will these drugs be used in practice," said Dr. John Bartlett, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins University, who was not connected to the studies. "If they become first-line drugs, that could mean a paradigm shift."

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Two studies of adult male circumcision to prevent HIV

Source: Medical News Today

WHAT: In December 2006, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, announced an early end to two clinical trials of adult male circumcision in Kenya and Uganda because an interim review of trial data showed that medically performed male circumcision significantly lowered a man's risk of acquiring HIV through heterosexual intercourse.

Two papers in The Lancet provide detailed analyses of these NIAID-funded trials. In the trial of 2,784 HIV-negative men in Kisumu, Kenya, the investigators found the rate of HIV acquisition in circumcised men to be 53 percent lower than in uncircumcised men. Investigators in the trial of 4,996 HIV-negative men in Rakai, Uganda, report that HIV acquisition was reduced by 51 percent in circumcised men.

ARTICLES:
"Male circumcision for HIV prevention in young men in Kisumu, Kenya: a randomised controlled trial," by R Bailey et al. The Lancet 369: 643-56 (2007). This trial was conducted by researchers from the University of Illinois at Chicago, the University of Manitoba and the University of Nairobi, Kenya.

"Male circumcision for HIV prevention in men in Rakai, Uganda: a randomised trial," by R Gray et al. The Lancet 369: 657-66 (2007). This trial was conducted by scientists from The Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health, Baltimore, and Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda.

Copies of these articles are available in the library.
Online access is also possible on the Lancet's Website (free registration required)

Smith gets jail in HIV sex case

Ex-Roughrider sentenced to six years: `I just want to say sorry for everything'

Source: Toronto Star

Feb 27, 2007 04:30 AM

REGINA–An apology to the Saskatchewan Roughriders, his children, his wife and his lovers wasn't enough to spare an HIV-positive former Canadian Football League linebacker a prison term for aggravated sexual assault.

Trevis Smith was sentenced yesterday to 5 1/2 years behind bars for knowingly exposing two women to the virus that causes AIDS by having unprotected sex with them and not revealing his condition.

Provincial court Judge Kenn Bellerose added another six months to the sentence for two bail violations Smith pleaded guilty to earlier in the day, making the sentence an even six years.

"For this, I apologize to this province and to the team that I represented the last seven years," Smith said from the prisoner's box in a barely audible voice before Bellerose made his ruling.

"I also want to apologize to the women that I've been involved with during this time and my wife for my actions and I ask that she'd forgive me for me committing adultery.

"I just want to say sorry for everything."

But Bellerose didn't waver.

"As far as I'm concerned, Mr. Smith was very deceitful and very dishonest," he said.

"I'm satisfied he displayed, throughout this whole time – from when he learned he had HIV in November of 2003 until the time of his arrest in October 2005 – a very indifferent attitude with respect to the expectations that the law required on his part to basically come clean with respect to his sexual partners."

Smith showed no reaction as the judge ruled. His wife, who had stood behind her husband throughout the entire trial and could be heard crying as he apologized, left court without talking to reporters.

His lawyer, Clemente Monterosso, also refused comment. An appeal of the conviction has already been filed.

[...]
To read the entire article, click here

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Herpes treatment helps infected women also fight HIV

Source: Medical News Today

Levels of HIV come down in HIV-positive women who are also infected with herpes simplex and are being treated for it with the antiviral drug valacyclovir.

These are the findings of a study published in today's New England Journal of Medicine.

The research was conducted in Burkina-Faso in Africa and took the form of a randomized, double-blind placebo-controlled trial.

Valocyclovir is marketed by GlaxoSmithKline as Valtrex.

Dr Nicolas Nagot of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and colleagues found that treating herpes simplex 2 (HSV-2) infections with valocyclovir reduced levels of HIV-1 RNA in both the blood plasma and the genital mucosa, with the latter being more significant.

And this effect seemed to get stronger over the three months of the study.

Once a woman has herpes, the risk of getting HIV is increased and other research studies have shown that when HSV-2 is present it increases the amount of HIV-1 in plasma and genital mucosa.

(...)

Health Canada examining information linking antiviral drug to development of treatment-resistant HIV

Source: Health Canada

February 21, 2007
For immediate release

OTTAWA - Health Canada is informing Canadians of new information submitted by the manufacturer of the antiviral drug Baraclude that suggests the drug may be linked to the development of a treatment-resistant strain of HIV in one patient with HIV.

Baraclude (the brand name for the drug entecavir) has been authorized in Canada since June 2006 for the treatment of active chronic infection with Hepatitis B virus in adults. This new information consists of a U.S. report of a patient, infected with both HIV and Hepatitis B virus, whose HIV infection became resistant to one of the more commonly used HIV treatment drugs while the individual was taking only Baraclude. In addition, this is one of three U.S. reports submitted by the manufacturer, Bristol-Myers Squibb Canada, concerning HIV patients who experienced a decrease in their HIV virus levels while using Baraclude, despite not being treated with HIV drugs. To date, studies of Baraclude do not suggest that the drug has any activity against HIV. Drugs which have activity against HIV may be associated with increased risk of developing treatment-resistant forms of HIV.

Health Canada is following up on this information and will provide Canadians with any new safety recommendations which may be warranted for the use of Baraclude when the review is completed.

Canadians taking Baraclude should consult with their physician if they have any questions or concerns.

Consumers requiring more information about this Information Update can contact Health Canada’s public enquiries line at (613) 957-2991, or toll free at 1-866-225-0709.

Any serious or unexpected adverse reactions in patients receiving Baraclude or any other drug should be reported to the Canadian Adverse Drug Reaction Monitoring Program (CADRMP) of Health Canada by one of the following methods:

Telephone: 1-866-234-2345
Facsimile: 1-866-678-6789

CADRMP
Marketed Health Products Directorate
Tunney's Pasture, AL 0701C
email: cadrmp@hc-sc.gc.ca

The CADRMP adverse reaction reporting form, including a version that can be completed and submitted online, is located on the MedEffect portal of the Health Canada Web site.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Failure of HIV microbicide raises concerns

Source: The scientist

By Andrea Gawrylewski

A microbicide designed to ward off HIV is unexpectedly linked to an increased risk of infection, prompting speculation about the future of microbicides against HIV.

Researchers shut down an HIV microbicide clinical trial last month in Africa and India after early data indicated microbicide users had a higher rate of infection than women using a placebo. The discouraging results have surprised and disappointed researchers, and may ultimately have a negative impact on the future role of microbicides in preventing the spread of the virus.

Several other microbicides are in the pipeline for testing and development, but this trial failure may push some researchers in the direction of other HIV prevention options, predicted Daniel Kuritzkes, director of AIDS research at Brigham and Women's Hospital. "The field is moving towards more specific approaches -- use of topical applications of antiviral drugs, as opposed to true microbicides," he told The Scientist. "The [closed trial's] results would make me less enthusiastic about pursuing other [microbicides]. I would be a bit leery about getting into microbicide studies."

Enrollment for the phase III trial for the cellulose-sulfate compound, called Ushercell, began in 2005. When it was stopped, the trial's preliminary analysis included 1,333 women in India, Uganda, Benin, and South Africa. Initial results showed that 35 women had contracted HIV while using the compound, a higher rate of infection than that seen in women using a placebo. CONRAD, the Arlington, Va.-based nonprofit reproductive health organization that funded the development and testing of Ushercell, halted the trial immediately.
(...)

New UNAIDS Report

Just released!
UNAIDS at country level. Supporting countries as they move towards universal access
C 500 UNA 2007
Geneva, UNAIDS, 2007.
This report is available online. Click here to download it. There's also a copy in the library.

Excerpts from the introduction:
"In 2005 and early 2006, the landscape of the AIDS response shifted dramatically. Global pessimism over the unchecked spread of the disease in the developing world receded in the face of impressive efforts to expand access to treatment. Signs that prevention efforts were bearing fruit were seen in a growing number of countries from the hardest-hit regions, which started to report drops in HIV rates, particularly among the young. (...)
During this period, the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) focused its country support work on two main areas. The first was improving the architecture of the AIDS response in the face of increasing complexity, growing resources and the involvement of new actors.(...) The second priority of country work was securing political commitment to a dramatic expansion of services for prevention, treatment, care and support. Through the universal access process, countries and regions assessed the current state of the epidemic, identified barriers preventing the expansion of services and began to develop roadmaps to considerably expand key services."

How much do you know about HIV?

Test your knowledge about HIV by taking a quiz!

- amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research: Test your AIDS I.Q.

- AVERT: Quizzes page. Several quizzes on HIV, HIV statistics, HIV and women, World AIDS Day, Sex, Pregnancy, Condoms.

- The Body: HIV/AIDS Quiz

- The World Bank: What do you know about World AIDS Day?

- CDC - Business responds to AIDS / Labor responds to AIDS: HIV/AIDS Workplace tools - AIDS 101 Quiz

- PBS, The age of AIDS: Quiz

Indonesia faces growing AIDS woes, Papua big worry: WHO

Source: Reuters

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesia faces a growing AIDS problem -- particularly among drug users and prostitutes -- while a recent survey shows two percent of the Papua population infected with HIV, the World Health Organization said on Saturday.

The sprawling, developing nation of 220 million people also faces constraints and lack of resources to cope with the problem, Bjorn Melgaard of the WHO said at the release of the report.

"Indonesia has one of the fastest growing HIV epidemics in Asia. Although the HIV prevalence among adults is still generally low, it has reached high levels among specific populations like injecting drug users and sex workers," the report said.

Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim nation but many of its citizens have a liberal attitude toward sex and prostitution is a thriving part of the economy in many areas.
(...)

See also WHO 2006 update - Indonesia

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Resources on HIV/AIDS and gender

Working with men, responding to AIDS : gender, sexuality and HIV - a case study collection
Brighton, UK, International HIV/AIDS Alliance, 2003
C 500 WOR 2003
Available online! Click here to download the document.
"Across the world, people working on HIV/AIDS now recognise the importance of developing their work with men in order to have a real impact on the epidemic. There is a growing interest in identifying strategies that will be effective in reaching out to different groups of men and enabling them to change their attitudes and behaviour. The International HIV/AIDS Alliance (the Alliance) shares this interest. (...)
The Alliance has produced this case study collection in order to help projects to conduct this work with men on HIV/AIDS. It presents experiences and lessons from a range of different projects (some supported by the Alliance and some not) that are working with men. By showcasing experiences and lessons from the field in the form of case studies, this collection offers inspiration, ideas and models for working with different kinds of men in a range of contexts."

The Gender and HIV/AIDS electronic library: A collection of resources including research, publications, training tools, and multi-media advocacy materials from the UNIFEM/UNAIDS Gender and HIV/AIDS Portal.
United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), 2005.
J 200 GEN 2005 (Click on call number to borrow this CD-ROM!)
"UNIFEM, with support from UNAIDS, has released a Gender and HIV/AIDS Electronic Library on CD-ROM that compiles resources from the UNIFEM Web Portal. It includes research and studies, training resources and tools, and multimedia advocacy materials on the gender dimensions of the HIV/AIDS epidemic produced by a variety of organizations. The Gender and HIV/AIDS Electronic Library is fully searchable by keyword and includes an easy-to-use tool called "e-Course Builder," which supports the creation of a tailored training course using the resources on the CD-ROM. The Library will be a useful resource for academics, policymakers, practitioners, journalists, students and others interested in the gender dimensions of the epidemic."

Gender, HIV/AIDS and rights : Training manual for the media
Rome, Inter Press Service, [2002]
H 230 MAD 2002
Available online! Click here to download the document.

Ottawa, Gates join in Canadian HIV vaccine search

Source: Reuters

OTTAWA (Reuters) - The Canadian government and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced C$139 million ($118 million) in funding on Tuesday for a Canadian initiative in the search for an HIV/AIDS vaccine.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates told a news conference that the money would go to an initiative that would try to accelerate development of a vaccine and address critical research gaps. Under the plan, a facility will be set up in Canada to manufacture and test HIV vaccine candidates.

Canada will provide up to C$111 million and the Gates Foundation up to C$28 million.

Thursday, February 15, 2007

New book in the library: AIDS in Africa: Three scenarios to 2025

AIDS in Africa: Three scenarios to 2025
Geneva, Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), 2005
Call number: C 510 AID 2005 (Click on call number to borrow this book!)
AIDS in Africa: Three scenarios to 2025 presents three possible case studies for how the AIDS epidemic in Africa could evolve over the next 20 years based on policy decisions taken today by African leaders and the rest of the world. The scenarios set out to answer one central question: 'Over the next 20 years, what factors will drive Africa's and the world's responses to the AIDS epidemic, and what kind of future will there be for the next generation?'...

This report is also available online

AIDS virus weakness detected, could help vaccine

Source: Reuters

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON, Feb 14 (Reuters) - Scientists have captured an image of the AIDS virus in a biological handshake with the immune cells it attacks, and said on Wednesday they hope this can help lead to a better vaccine against the incurable disease.

They pinpointed a place on the outside of the human immunodeficiency virus that could be vulnerable to antibodies that could block it from infecting human cells.

U.S. National Institutes of Health researcher Peter Kwong said the study, published in the journal Nature, may reveal HIV's long-sought "site of vulnerability" that can be targeted with a vaccine aimed at preventing initial infection.

"Having that site and knowing that you can make antibodies against it means that a vaccine is possible," Kwong said in a telephone interview.

"It doesn't say we've gotten there. But it's taken it off the list from an impossible dream and converted it to something that is a (mere) technical barrier."

Experts agree that a vaccine is the only hope of stopping the pandemic of AIDS, which has killed more than 25 million people since it was first recognized in 1981. About 40 million people now live with HIV, with sub-Saharan Africa hardest hit.

But while dozens of potential vaccines are in development, only two AIDS vaccine candidates are in advanced human trials -- one made by Merck and Co. and another by Sanofi-Aventis SA .

Because the virus attacks immune system cells, it has been especially difficult to design a vaccine to fight it.

The team at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, part of the NIH, made atomic-level images of the virus.

They revealed the structure of a protein on the surface of HIV as it looks while the protein is bound to an infection-fighting antibody. They said this protein, called gp120, seems susceptible to attack by this antibody, which is called b12 and is capable of broadly neutralizing the virus.

An antibody is an immune system protein that helps seek and destroy invaders like viruses and bacteria.
(...)

Merck cuts price on AIDS drug Efavirenz

Source: Reuters

By Nopporn Wong-Anan

BANGKOK, Feb 15 (Reuters) - Merck & Co. announced on Thursday price cuts for its HIV-AIDS drug, Efavirenz, in poor countries and those hard hit by the disease, including Thailand which plans to make copycat versions of the medicine.

Thailand, which shocked Merck in November when it announced plans to break the company's patent for Efavirenz, would see its price drop to 700 baht ($19.59) per patient per month.

Merck had previously sold Efavirenz at a non-profit price of 1,300 baht per treatment per month in Thailand, which plans to import Indian-made versions of the drug for 800 baht per month until it is available from Thailand's state-owned drug maker.

"Merck is lowering the price of the 600 mg formulation of Efavirenz due to efficiencies resulting from improved manufacturing processes," the company said.

A spokesman for Merck's Thai subsidiary also attributed the lower Thai price to a more favourable exchange rate.

Last month, the Health Ministry issued compulsory licences for the heart disease drug Plavix, made by Bristol-Myers Squibb and Sanofi-Aventis and Abbott Laboratories' Kaletra to treat HIV/AIDS after a similar move on another AIDS drug last year.

The licences, which Thai health officials said would save the country up to 800 million baht ($24 million) a year, drew praise from AIDS activists but flak from Washington and the drug industry, which are urging the ministry to rescind them.
(...)

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Pfizer's AIDS drug to get faster review

Source: Reuters

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Pfizer Inc. said on Tuesday its HIV treatment maraviroc will receive an accelerated review from regulators in the United States and Europe.

If approved by the regulatory agencies, maraviroc would be the first in a new class of HIV/AIDS treatments called CCR5 antagonists that work by blocking viral entry, the drug maker said.

Most existing HIV drugs work inside the body's immune cells, after the virus has infected a patient.

Rather than fighting HIV inside white blood cells, CCR5 antagonists prevent the virus produced by infected cells from entering uninfected cells by blocking its predominant entry route, the CCR5 co-receptor.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration grants accelerated reviews to potential medicines that could represent a major improvement over current treatments. The expedited process means the agency will decide whether to approve the drug within six months, rather than the more typical period of up to one year.

More information:
Trading Markets.com

Monday, February 12, 2007

HIV sceptics beyond stupid, says top scientist

Source: The Australian

Jeremy Roberts
February 13, 2007

THE man jointly credited with discovering HIV has blasted the Supreme Court of South Australia for wasting time hearing a case that questions the existence of the killer virus.
Robert Gallo, the American scientist who established the link between HIV and AIDS in 1984, appeared for the prosecution yesterday in the application for an appeal by an HIV-positive man convicted of exposing three women to the virus.
"I can't believe that it occupies the time of the court - it is that absurd," Professor Gallo said.

Defence witnesses - medical physicist Eleni Papadopulos-Eleopulos and emergency doctor Val Turner - have testified that the science behind HIV is flawed, that the virus has not been purified, that tests for it are indirect and unreliable, and that it is not sexually transmitted or the cause of AIDS.

They appeared for Andre Chad Parenzee, 36, who was convicted in February last year on three counts of endangering life.

Professor Gallo said he had reviewed much of the defence testimony and rejected it as "misunderstanding" at best, and "misrepresentation" of HIV and AIDS research, at worst.

He called on numerous medical fields and his vast research experience to describe HIV, its first laboratory isolation in the 1980s, its attack on the immune system, and the success of treatments and blood screening.

Professor Gallo's testimony was a coup for prosecutors, who have fought Parenzee's application in more than three weeks of hearings since March last year. (...)


Read also:
25 million dead people can't be wrong. Or can they?
HIV discoverer blasts doubters in SA court

Malaysia's HIV/AIDS epidemic rising and spreading fast

Source: All Headlines

February 12, 2007 10:59 a.m. EST

Patricia Shehan - All Headline News Staff Writer
Malaysia (AHN) - Malaysia's HIV/AIDS epidemic is rising and spreading fast. The number of HIV infections could rise to more than 300,000 by the year 2015 if something isn't done. That would be more than fourfold the current status, according to a top health official's warning to the public as reported on Sunday.

Although high-risk groups, such as drug addicts are spreading the disease quickly, the health ministry has indicated that those infected with the HIV virus are now expanding. The disease is infecting many women, fisherman, lorry drivers and factory workers, according to a recent Australian news report.

The heterosexual infectious transmission is rising, causing a "worrying trend," especially among women, according to Malaysia's government health official.

Currently there are approximately 73,000 Malaysians who have been infected with HIV. Although a great majority - about 75 percent - of infected Malaysians are IV drug users, the percentage of women in particular is quickly rising.

Although the government took a stance to fight the disease beginning with a five-year strategy that began in 2006, the Malaysian government indicates their success will depend on public cooperation.

According to the Malaysian Health Ministry, every day there are three people who die from an AIDS-related illness in the country, the AP reported.

Tuesday, February 06, 2007

New compound shows promise in halting HIV spread

Source: Medical News today

A new compound has shown promise in halting the spread of HIV by preventing the virus from replicating. Developed by Temple University researchers, 2-5AN6B could someday work as an effective treatment for HIV especially in conjunction with current drug treatments. Their work is published in the January issue of AIDS Research and Human Retroviruses.

A nucleic acid, 2-5AN6B inhibited HIV replication in white blood cells from a group of 18 HIV infected patients by up to 80 percent, regardless of the patients' treatment regimens.

"A cure for HIV infection remains an elusive goal despite the significant impact of current treatments because of the virus' ability to adapt to and resist those treatments, and bypass the immune system's natural defenses," said Robert J. Suhadolnik, Ph.D., prinicipal investigator and professor of biochemistry at Temple University School of Medicine. "This compound prompts the body to restore its natural antiviral defense systems against the invading virus."

Current drugs for HIV work by blocking one of the steps toward virus replication.

"This new anti-HIV compound works by a very different mechanism, and would appear to offer the promise of someday being combined with existing anti-viral therapies for a much more effective treatment. It is also very important that this compound is much less likely to be defeated by the ability of the virus to mutate, a problem often encountered with existing anti-viral drugs," said Thomas Rogers, Ph.D., co-author and professor of pharmacology at Temple.

This work builds on decades of research by the Temple team which was recently awarded a grant from the National Institutes of Health to continue pre-clinical studies on a larger scale. They'll be investigating the molecular mechanisms of 2-5AN6B as a potential weapon against HIV, and continue work on a new therapeutic approach involving gene therapy for the treatment of HIV infection.

Monday, February 05, 2007

Topics in HIV Medicine, Vol. 14, issue 5, Dec 06 / Jan 07

Perspectives

Immunizations for HIV-infected Adults: Indications, Timing, and Response
David H. Spach, MD
Link to full-text (free access)

Prioritizing Primary Care in HIV: Comorbidity, Toxicity, and Demography
Amy C. Justice, MD, PhD
Link to full-text (free access)

Renal Disease and Toxicities: Issues for HIV Care Providers
Derek M. Fine, MD
Link to full-text (free access)

Hepatitis B Virus Treatment in HIV-infected Patients
Chloe L. Thio, MD
Link to full-text (free access)

A print copy is also available in the library.

Washington men get hard-to-treat HIV strain

The Advocate

A hard-to-treat strain of the virus that causes AIDS has been found in four gay men in King County, Washington, and authorities fear it could spread to more. There is no evidence that the troublesome strain of HIV is spreading rapidly, but its appearance underscores the need for renewed emphasis on safe sex practices, officials in the Seattle-King County public health department said Thursday.

"There may be more cases we don't know about," said Dr. Bob Wood, the agency's HIV-AIDS program director. "We are still working to learn more about these individuals and the virus they have contracted," said Dorothy F. Teeter, interim director of the department. "We are concerned for these individuals and their partners and are continuing our investigation."

The same genetic strain of HIV was found over a 15-month period in all four men, methamphetamine users who each had multiple partners, but none is known to have had sex with any of the other three, officials said. "That's highly unusual," said Dr. Peter Shalit, who treats HIV-AIDS patients and directs HIV-AIDS research at Swedish Medical Center.

One possibility is that there is a new strain of multi-drug-resistant HIV that is spread more easily than previous drug-resistant strains, "definitely a scary prospect," Shalit said.

"There's no evidence that this has spread outside of King County," said Dr. Patrick Sullivan, chief of the behavioral and clinical surveillance branch at the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the center also hasn't compared this strain with ones outside of King County because the center studies disease from a population, not an individual, perspective, he said Friday in a telephone interview.

One man in New York, diagnosed with HIV in December 2004, was found to have a multi-drug-resistant type of HIV and he too had multiple, anonymous sexual partners, a history of methamphetamine use, and had sex with men, according to the CDC. (...)

Thursday, February 01, 2007

2nd International Conference on HIV treatment adherence

International Association of Physicians in AIDS Care IAPAC
Hyatt Regency Hotel, Jersey City, NJ - March 28-30, 2007

Adherence to medical treatment for HIV/AIDS is an essential determinant of treatment success or failure. Yet, we have much to learn about measurement and intervention for adherence - it is a complex challenge that requires multidisciplinary cooperation among providers, researchers, government agencies, and patients.

The goal of this conference is to provide an international forum for the presentation and discussion of state-of-the-science HIV treatment adherence research, as well as current behavioral and clinical perspectives in practicum. Our ultimate hope is that this dialogue translates into evidence-based implementation of approaches for real world clinical and community settings.

This activity is targeted to physicians, nurses, pharmacists, psychologists, psychologists, social workers, researchers, and other healthcare professionals with an interest in the treatment of HIV/AIDS.

Program, registration:
http://www.iapac.org/home.asp?pid=7973

AIDS Epidemic Update - December 2006

Published by UNAIDS (The joint United Natiosn Programme on HIV/AIDS), the annual AIDS epidemic update reports on the latest developments in the global AIDS epidemic. With maps and regional summaries, the 2006 edition provides the most recent estimates of the epidemic’s scope and human toll, explores new trends in the epidemic’s evolution.
A copy of the AIDS Epidemic update is available in the library and online.

Tests of drug to block HIV infection are halted over safety

By LAWRENCE K. ALTMAN, The New York Times

Efforts to develop a topical microbicide to prevent H.I.V. infection during sex suffered a surprising setback yesterday when researchers announced that they had stopped two full-scale trials for safety reasons.

The trials, in Africa and India, involved a chemical, cellulose sulfate or Ushercell, and were the second failure of a potential microbicide in a full-scale trial in recent years. In one of the latest trials, a standard check by an independent scientific committee found an increased risk of H.I.V. infection among women who used cellulose sulfate compared with those who used a placebo gel.

In 2000, a large full-scale trial showed that the only other microbicide candidate, nonoxynol-9, was unsafe when it had been expected to be effective. Subjects in that trial developed a higher incidence of H.I.V. infection, presumably through ulcers caused by chemical irritation.

Yesterday, AIDS researchers at the World Health Organization, the United Nations AIDS program and other organizations expressed hope that at least one of three other potential microbicides undergoing full-scale testing would prove to be safe and effective. The others are Pro 2000 by Indevus Pharmaceuticals, BufferGel by ReProtect and Carraguard, whose trademark is held by the Population Council.

“While the closing of these trials is a profound disappointment for the microbicide field, we cannot let it paralyze us,” said Dr. Zeda Rosenberg, chief executive of the nonprofit International Partnership for Microbicides in Silver Spring, Md.

In the absence of an AIDS vaccine, specialists say development of a microbicide is a public health priority, mainly to protect the many women in poor countries whose partners refuse to use condoms. Such protection could take the form of a gel, cream, film, tablet or sponge that could be inserted into the vagina or rectum.

The study that led to stopping the trials involved 1,333 participants in Benin, South Africa and Uganda. Conrad, a health research organization in Arlington, Va., conducted the study.

Conrad said the independent committee found more new H.I.V. infections among those who used cellulose sulfate than among those who used an inactive gel, but did not report any numbers. Final numbers are expected in March, a spokeswoman for Conrad said.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/01/health/01aids.html?ref=world

Over 50's more likely to have elevated lipids and glucose during HIV therapy

AIDSMAP, Michel Carter.
http://www.aidsmap.com/en/news/0CC9C076-C428-4925-9744-D3AA67BF586F.asp

Older HIV-positive patients are more likely than HIV-positive individuals under the age of 35 to experience increases in blood sugar, cholesterol and triglycerides after a year of antiretroviral therapy, Italian investigators report in the November edition of HIV Medicine. The study also revealed that older patients have a greater risk than younger patients of developing certain co-morbidities such as heart disease or diabetes after taking HIV treatment. However, the investigators found that anti-HIV therapy had a similar virological and immunological effect in older and younger patients.

With prompt diagnosis and appropriate treatment there is increasing optimism that HIV-positive individuals will survive into old age. The demographics of the HIV-positive population are already changing. In Italy in 1985, for example, the median age for male HIV-infected individuals was 29 and 24 for female patients. By 2004, these ages had increased to a median of 41 and 38 years.
Although older age has been associated with faster HIV disease progression and increased mortality, HIV treatment guidelines do not make any specific recommendations regarding the use of antiretrovirals in older patients.

Therefore, doctors in Milan conducted longitudinal analysis comparing treatment outcomes, the rate of metabolic complications, and the incidence of side-effects and new co-morbidities after the first year of HIV therapy in patients aged over 50 years and those aged between 25 and 35 years.

A total of 159 older patients and 118 controls were included in the investigators’ analysis. The older patients had a mean age of 59 years compared to 30 years in the younger patients.
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Reference
Orlando G et al. Antiretroviral treatment and age-related comorbidities in a cohort of older HIV-infected patients. HIV Med 7: 549 – 557, 2006.