AIDS/HIV
Monkey trial may show possible way to AIDS vaccine
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A shot that helps keep AIDS-infected monkeys alive may offer the best clues yet about how to make an effective HIV vaccine, researchers reported on Thursday.
The experiment provided important clues about how the AIDS virus destroys the immune system, and how to track the health of infected people, the researchers said.
“A vaccine of this type does not appear to prevent infection,” Dr. Norman Letvin of Harvard Medical School in Boston, who helped lead the study, said in a telephone interview. What the vaccine may do, he said, is help infected people live longer without becoming ill.
Poverty fuels HIV among black heterosexuals
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Poverty is a key reason why African-American heterosexuals have a far higher rate of infection with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, than other racial groups, a new study suggests.
Between 1999 and 2002, three-quarters of heterosexually transmitted HIV cases in 29 U.S. states were diagnosed among African Americans. But the reasons for the racial disparity have been “elusive,” according to the authors of the new study, led by Dr. Adaora A. Adimora of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
For their study, published in the Journal of Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndromes, the researchers interviewed 206 black HIV-positive men and women living in North Carolina, as well as 226 HIV-negative adults.
International Study Investigating Early Biology of HIV Infection
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In July 2005, the race to find a vaccine that would stem the worldwide rate of 13,000 new cases of HIV infection each day moved from competition among research institutions to a strategy of cooperation.
An international “virtual research center” - the Center for HIV/AIDS Vaccine Immunology (CHAVI) - was awarded up to $300 million over seven years to support efforts to develop an HIV vaccine.
The first of several research studies in this collaboration now is under way and is aimed at gaining new knowledge into the biology of HIV infection during its earliest days, before the immune system has produced antibodies to the virus.
Antibiotic May Help Fight Dementia in HIV Patients
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An antibiotic may help prevent dementia in HIV patients, according to a study that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology 58th Annual Meeting in San Diego, Calif., April 1 - 8, 2006.
“People infected with HIV often develop dementia as part of their illness, but there is currently no specific treatment for this complication,” said the study’s lead author, Jeffrey Rumbaugh, MD, PhD, of Johns Hopkins University. According to the researchers, two HIV proteins, called Tat and gp120, have been implicated in the development of HIV dementia.
One effect of these proteins is to reduce expression of a neuronal membrane receptor, called EAAT-2 (excitatory amino acid transporter-2). EAAT-2 absorbs the neurotransmitter glutamate from the space between neurons (the synapse), thereby preventing excess neuronal excitation which can cause cell death. Researchers believe that by reducing EAAT-2, the HIV proteins increase brain damage, which leads to dementia in patients.
China says it’s caring for Henan AIDS villagers
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An official from a poverty-stricken area of China where some believe hundreds of thousands of villagers have HIV/AIDS said on Wednesday the number is less than 8,000 and they are doing well with government help.
International groups estimated that a botched blood-selling scheme in the 1990s had infected a million villagers with HIV in the impoverished central province of Henan, where the municipality of Zhu Madian was worst hit.
Song Xuantao, the Communist Party chief for Zhu Madian, told reporters that of a population of 8.3 million, only 7,800 HIV carriers had been found in a 2003 screening. All were being offered free treatment and were receiving allowances.
Steroid useful in HIV, dangerous to the healthy
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An oral anabolic steroid can restore the muscle and fat tissue often lost to HIV/AIDS, but the side effects highlight the dangers that steroids pose to healthy people who abuse them, according to researchers.
Their study of 262 HIV-positive men found that the steroid, called oxandrolone, helped treat the substantial weight loss, or wasting, that can arise as a complication of HIV/AIDS. After 12 weeks, men who took the oral drug everyday showed gains in both weight and muscle tissue.
The side effects of treatment included an increase in LDL, or “bad,” cholesterol, and a drop in “good” HDL cholesterol. Some men also developed signs of liver toxicity.
Merck cutting AIDS drug price in poor countries
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Merck & Co. Inc. is cutting the price charged for its brand-name version of efavirenz (sold as Sustiva in the U.S. and Stocrin in Europe) for HIV infection by 20 percent in poor countries, bringing it within “pennies” of the cost of generics, the U.S. drug maker said on Tuesday.
The lower price reflects new efficiencies and cost savings resulting from improved manufacturing processes at a new factory for making the drug in Australia, the company said.
HIV Transmission in Prison
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Until recently, few data were available on how many prisoners become infected in prison. The data that were available suggested that “transmission does occur in correctional facilities, but at quite low rates.” This was sometimes used to argue that HIV transmission in prisons is rare and that there is no need for increased prevention efforts.
However, most of the studies that have reported relatively low levels of HIV transmission in prison were conducted early in the HIV epidemic and sampled long-term prisoners who would have been at less risk of infection than short-term prisoners. The extent of HIV infection occurring in prisons may have been underestimated. In recent years, a growing number of studies undertaken in Scotland, Australia, Lithuania, and Russia have shown how frighteningly quickly HIV can spread behind bars. Two of these studies are summarized in more detail here.
HIV Subtype Predicts Likelihood of Early Death from AIDS
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Johns Hopkins scientists say an infected person’s HIV subtype is a better predictor than viral load for determining rapid death from AIDS. Traditional testing standards help monitor the progression of an HIV infection to AIDS by keeping track of viral load, using a scale in which less than 50 viral particles per cubic milliliter of blood is considered suppressed disease and a viral load of more than 75,000 particles per cubic milliliter of blood means that the disease will progress more rapidly.
In what is believed to be the first analysis of viral subtype as a predictor of death from AIDS, which also takes into account viral load, the Hopkins team found that having viral subtype D made a person with HIV likely to die more rapidly compared to a person with subtype A.
HIV/AIDS in China a major cause for concern
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Despite the announcement by China that it has dropped its estimate of the number of HIV/AIDS victims in the country by nearly 30 percent, world health experts are warning against complacency, and are saying the HIV/AIDS numbers are in fact still rising and many people are unaware of the dangers.
In China last year health experts say as many as 200 people a day became infected with HIV, and the disease was now moving from high-risk groups like sex workers and intravenous drug users into the general population.
Experimental vaginal gel inhibits HIV and HSV
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Vaginal application of the PRO 2000 gel exerts activity against HIV and herpes simplex virus (HSV), investigators report in The Journal of Infectious Diseases.
However, PRO 2000 and the many other microbicides being investigated to protect against HIV transmission face multiple challenges before they can made widely available, authors of a second Journal article note.
PRO 2000 gel (Indevus Pharmaceuticals) is a synthetic compound that prevents HIV entry into cells by interacting with the proteins on the surface of the virus. While this agent has demonstrated the ability to inhibit HIV and HSV in cell cultures and in animal models, it was not known if it would be active after application in the human vagina.
Talks between Bulgaria, Libya delayed as emotions run high over HIV children fund
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Five Bulgarian nurses and one Palestinian doctor, who had been sentenced to death by firing squad, following a conviction of infecting 426 children with HIV in a hospital, have had that conviction quashed and a new trial has been ordered by Libya’s Supreme Court.
The six medics have been in jail since 1999 accused of deliberately infecting the youngsters in a hospital in the Mediterranean port of Benghazi.
Africans meet in Nigeria to share news on HIV/AIDS
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African scientists and others involved in the fight against HIV/AIDS in the worst-hit continent opened a conference on Sunday in the Nigerian capital to pool the latest information and ideas.
Organizers said that while previous big international HIV/AIDS conferences aimed at raising awareness of the epidemic, the focus now is on finding ways to make better use of funds and implement projects more effectively.
“Our number one concern is to make the money work,” said Peter Piot, head of UNAIDS, at a news conference just before the launch of the 14th International Conference on HIV/AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Infections in Africa (ICASA).
Singapore informs spouses of HIV-positive partners
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Singapore’s Health Ministry has started informing spouses of HIV-positive patients directly about their partners’ disease in order to curb the spread of AIDS, the ministry said.
Letters had been hand-delivered to 41 women since July informing them that their husbands were HIV-positive, the ministry quoted Senior Minister of State for Health Balaji Sadasivan as saying in a speech made on Monday.
A ministry official declined to elaborate on Tuesday, referring to the ministry’s Web site for more details.
Africa could stop babies getting HIV, experts say
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A Nigerian HIV-positive mother, whose two children did not contract the virus, challenged African countries on Saturday to make better use of simple, affordable tools to reduce mother-to-child transmission.
Adding her voice to those of world experts who met in Abuja to assess the fight against transmission to babies, Lucy Auwalu said antenatal care, drugs, information and clean water could give hope to HIV-positive African women who wanted children.
