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Scientists find major shortcomings in assessing CVD risk in HIV patients

At the same time that medical science has nearly eliminated AIDS deaths in patients treated for human immunodeficiency virus, two international meetings of HIV/AIDS scientists and patient advocates find major shortcomings in the design and analysis of studies used to assess cardiovascular disease risk in people with HIV with significant implications for improving medical care.

20 Jul 2010

AHF calls upon US to honor commitment to PEPFAR

Doctors and AIDS advocates from AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), which provides AIDS medical care to more than 138,000 individuals in 23 countries worldwide, will host a press conference at the International AIDS Conference in Vienna on Monday, July 19th at 12 noon (Media Center, Room PCR #3) to reiterate their call on the United States to honor the its landmark commitment to PEPFAR (the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), the successful US global AIDS program.

20 Jul 2010

WHO advises earlier treatment for people with HIV

An estimated 5.2 million people were receiving life-saving HIV treatment at the end of 2009, according to the latest update from the WHO. WHO estimates that 1.2 million people started treatment in 2009, bringing the total number of people receiving treatment to 5.2 million, compared to 4 million at the end of 2008.

20 Jul 2010

BC-CfE study suggests HAART may prevent transmission, spread of HIV

The BC Centre of Excellence in HIV/AIDS published an important study today in the globally respected Lancet medical journal. The study strongly reinforces the view that the benefits of highly active antiretroviral therapy extend beyond treatment of the virus to significantly preventing the transmission and spread of HIV.

20 Jul 2010

Cash rewards help combat STIs in rural Africa, study finds

Giving out cash can be an effective tool in combating sexually transmitted infections in rural Africa, according to a new study conducted jointly by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, the Development Research Group at the World Bank and the Ifakara Health Institute in Tanzania.

20 Jul 2010

AIDS 2010 studies, releases: Treating HIV-positive patients with ARVs drove down number of new HIV infections, study finds

"Treating HIV patients with cocktails of AIDS drugs helps to stop them spreading the infection further and more than halved the number of new HIV diagnoses in a study in Canada, scientists said on Sunday," Reuters reports.

20 Jul 2010

International organizations mutually agree to eradicate pediatric HIV/AIDS by 2015

A global alliance of international organizations, including the heads of UNICEF, UNAIDS and The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria as well as other NGOs including the Pan African Treatment Access Movement, Health GAP, Ugandan Pediatric Association and the Global AIDS Alliance today agreed to take concerted action to eliminate pediatric HIV/AIDS over the next five years, preventing nearly 400,000 children annually from beginning their lives infected with the virus that causes AIDS.

20 Jul 2010

New microbicide gel reduces woman's risk of being infected with HIV, genital herpes

Today at the XVIII International AIDS Conference in Vienna, Austria, members of the International Rectal Microbicide Advocates (IRMA) and thousands of other HIV advocates and scientists cheered a long-awaited, much anticipated success in the quest for new HIV prevention technologies. Researchers announced that a vaginal gel has been shown to significantly reduce a woman's risk of being infected with HIV and genital herpes

20 Jul 2010

T-SPOT.TB test predicts TB infected persons better than TST: Study

The authors of a recent study published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine concluded that the T-SPOT.TB test is better than the tuberculin skin test at predicting which patients will develop active TB.

20 Jul 2010

Abbott presents 48-week PROGRESS study results at 28th International AIDS Conference

Abbott today presented 48-week findings comparing an HIV regimen of its protease inhibitor (PI), Kaletra® (lopinavir/ritonavir), and Merck's integrase inhibitor, Isentress® (raltegravir), to a traditional HIV regimen of Kaletra and the nucleotide/nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTIs) in Truvada® (tenofovir and emtricitabine) in antiretroviral-naive adult patients. Efficacy data were collected over the first 48 weeks of the 96-week PROGRESS (PROtease/InteGRasE Simplification Study) study.

20 Jul 2010

Infants in African countries receive minimum help to reduce risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission: Study

Only about half of infants born to HIV-infected mothers in some African countries receive a minimum preventive dose of the drug nevirapine to help reduce the risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission, according to a study in the July 21 issue of JAMA, a theme issue on HIV/AIDS.

20 Jul 2010

International AIDS conference focuses on HIV prevention, U.S. poverty-infection link

Speeches and studies at the international HIV/AIDS conference, now underway in Vienna, were covered by a variety of news outlets.

20 Jul 2010

AIDS 2010 opens: Leaders weigh in on global HIV/AIDS funding; Clinton, Gates on efficiency

The six-day International AIDS Conference-AIDS 2010 kicked off Sunday in Vienna, Austria "amid resurgent fears that advances in the 29-year war against the disease were threatened by a slump in funding," Agence France-Presse reports.

20 Jul 2010

FDA joins Tox21 collaboration for improved chemical screening

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences National Toxicology Program (NTP) and the National Institute of Health Chemical Genomics Center (NCGC) welcome the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to the Tox21 collaboration. The Tox21 collaboration merges federal agency resources (research, funding and testing tools) to develop ways to more effectively predict how chemicals will affect human health and the environment. The collaboration was established in 2008 to develop models that will be able to better predict how chemicals will affect humans. FDA will provide additional expertise and chemical safety information to improve current chemical testing methods.

20 Jul 2010

PSI showcases evidence-based HIV prevention methods at International AIDS Conference

Technical staff from PSI, a leading global health organization operating in more than 60 countries around the world, are currently attending the 18th International AIDS Conference in Vienna to showcase PSI's innovative, evidence-based HIV prevention methods, which have helped to successfully avert more than one billion cases of HIV infection over the past 40 years.

20 Jul 2010

Benefits of drug L-methionine for neurogenic bladder disorders unclear

It is unclear whether patients with neurogenic bladder disorders benefit from the drug L-methionine. The only study currently available provides neither proof of benefit nor proof of harm. This is the result of a report published by the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG) on 12 July 2010.

20 Jul 2010

A look into HIV related issues

According to a report from US health officials, the poorer neighborhoods of America's cities harbour at least 1 in 50 heterosexual adults infected with HIV. These figures are more than elsewhere in the country. According to the research team from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), being poor and getting HIV are linked and this was regardless of race or ethnicity.

19 Jul 2010

First Edition: July 19, 2010

Today's headlines include the latest news regarding the politics of implementing health reform as well as developments from the international AIDS conference now underway in Vienna.

19 Jul 2010

Phase 2 CUBICIN study for prosthetic joint infections meets primary endpoint

Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a leading acute care therapeutics company, today announced that its Phase 2 safety study of CUBICIN (daptomycin for injection) in the treatment of prosthetic joint infections caused by certain Gram positive pathogens met its study objectives. This study was a first-of-its-kind randomized controlled Phase 2 trial studying anti-infective therapy in the setting of 2-stage surgery for the replacement of infected prosthetic hip or knee joints.

19 Jul 2010

Phase II data on Genetic Immunity's DermaVir vaccine to be presented at XVIII International AIDS Conference

Genetic Immunity, a US/Hungarian biopharmaceutical company developing nanomedicine-based immunotherapies for HIV/AIDS and other chronic diseases, is releasing Phase II data on the Company's novel DermaVir therapeutic vaccine for HIV/AIDS during the XVIII International AIDS Conference this week in Vienna, Austria. DermaVir, the first dendritic cell-targeting topical HIV vaccine candidate, employs nanotechnology to induce multi-faceted and long-lived immune responses capable of eliminating HIV infected cells.

19 Jul 2010

Disease/Infection News

Scientists find major shortcomings in assessing CVD risk in HIV patients

AHF calls upon US to honor commitment to PEPFAR

WHO advises earlier treatment for people with HIV

BC-CfE study suggests HAART may prevent transmission, spread of HIV

Cash rewards help combat STIs in rural Africa, study finds

AIDS 2010 studies, releases: Treating HIV-positive patients with ARVs drove down number of new HIV infections, study finds

International organizations mutually agree to eradicate pediatric HIV/AIDS by 2015

New microbicide gel reduces woman's risk of being infected with HIV, genital herpes

T-SPOT.TB test predicts TB infected persons better than TST: Study

Abbott presents 48-week PROGRESS study results at 28th International AIDS Conference

Infants in African countries receive minimum help to reduce risk of mother-to-child HIV transmission: Study

International AIDS conference focuses on HIV prevention, U.S. poverty-infection link

AIDS 2010 opens: Leaders weigh in on global HIV/AIDS funding; Clinton, Gates on efficiency

FDA joins Tox21 collaboration for improved chemical screening

PSI showcases evidence-based HIV prevention methods at International AIDS Conference

Benefits of drug L-methionine for neurogenic bladder disorders unclear

A look into HIV related issues

First Edition: July 19, 2010

Phase 2 CUBICIN study for prosthetic joint infections meets primary endpoint

Phase II data on Genetic Immunity's DermaVir vaccine to be presented at XVIII International AIDS Conference

How can microdialysis benefit drug development

Global and Local Efforts to Take Action Against Hepatitis

Addressing Important Cardiac Biology Questions with Shotgun Top-Down Proteomics

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