Ahead of AIDS Conference, New Reasons for Hope

HealthDay – 15 hrs ago THURSDAY, July 19 (HealthDay News) -- The first glimmer of hope for a cure for HIV came in 1996 with the advent of powerful drug cocktails known as highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART). But the feeling was short-lived.

While HAART has drastically reduced deaths due to AIDS and other HIV-related diseases, it is no cure -- if patients stop taking the medications (because of side effects or other reasons), the virus bounces right back, as a 2010 study of patients in Latin America and the Caribbean showed.

Yet, there is now a renewed sense of promise that, even if it still years away, researchers have a better understanding of targets that could lead to a cure, said Rowena Johnston, vice president and director of research at the Foundation for AIDS Research. "We are seeing something that is probably a lot like that time in the 1990s," she said.

In 2012, new causes for optimism include approval of a new drug, Truvada, that can help prevent the spread of HIV, safer and more effective drugs to treat those who are infected and better efforts to diagnose HIV/AIDS in people who don't realize they have it.

These and other achievements will be a focus at the biennial International AIDS Conference, held this year in Washington, D.C. The meeting, which begins Sunday, has not been held in the United States in 22 years. Its return stems from the Obama administration's decision in 2009 to end the ban on HIV-positive people entering the country, Johnston said.

Hints at a cure

Another "large part of the basis for the new optimism" comes from the experience of one patient back in 2008, Johnston said. That was Timothy Brown, also known as "the Berlin patient," who was pronounced cured of HIV by his doctors.

The cure involved a special kind of blood transplant that Brown received for his leukemia from a donor that happened to have rare, mutant cells that did not allow HIV to take hold. This procedure is "absolutely not practical" for the general population, Johnston said, but it has launched research looking at ways to mimic the effect, by using gene therapy to make a patient's cells resistant to HIV.

"

View the Original article

In Washington, free HIV-AIDS testing while you wait

"Faced with the highest HIV-AIDS rates in the United States, community health activists in the nation's capital have come up with a novel way for people to save their own lives while killing time. (AFP Photo/Jim Watson)" title

View the Original article

Nobel laureate, discoverer of HIV, sees 'hope' for cure

"http://l.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/YLy5wt1bM2.LndLAEHJSuw--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTcwO3E9ODU7dz03MA--/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/afp.com/photo_1342768236838-1-0.jpg" width

View the Original article

WHO endorses use of HIV medicines for prevention

Reuters – 2 hrs 27 mins ago NEW YORK (Reuters) - The World Health Organization has endorsed using HIV medicines among people who do not have the infection but are at high risk of getting it, and suggested that poor and wealthy countries alike set up pilot projects to better understand the benefits.

The United Nations agency made its suggestion on Friday, four days after U.S. regulators approved use of Gilead Sciences Inc's Truvada for people who are not infected but may engage in sexual activity with HIV-positive partners. The concept is known as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP).

Truvada, which combines the anti-HIV drugs tenofovir and emtricitabine in one pill, is widely used to treat people already infected with the virus that causes AIDS. The medicine, which costs almost $14,000 a year in the United States, is the first treatment also approved for prevention.

"WHO is encouraging countries wishing to introduce PrEP to first establish small projects to help public health workers to better understand and realize its potential benefits," the agency said in a statement. It said appropriate HIV medicines should be given to those at high risk of infection.

"These could include men or transgender women who have sex with men," the group said.

WHO spokeswoman Sarah Russell said the agency could not recommend specific drugs for prevention, but she said, "It needs to be a drug like Truvada that has been developed for prevention purposes."

Russell said WHO expects Gilead to make Truvada available at a deeply discounted price in some poor countries.

"We believe Gilead will bring the price down to about $100 per year per person" in those countries, she said in an interview.

Gilead officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

WHO noted that an international study called Partners PrEP has shown that HIV medicines are highly effective at preventing the illness in men and women whose partners are infected.

That study, conducted in Kenya and Uganda and funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, involved taking a daily tablet containing tenofovir or tenofovir in combination with emtricitabine.

The U.N. agency said it would evaluate the outcomes of the small projects, along with evolving scientific evidence, before issuing its own detailed guidelines next year on the use of HIV treatments for prevention.

WHO said it was important that people taking HIV drugs for prevention are HIV-negative because otherwise drug resistant forms of HIV could evolve. The agency said they should also continue using condoms and faithfully take their medicines on a daily basis.

(Reporting By Ransdell Pierson; Editing by Toni Reinhold)

View the Original article

Biology Leaves Gay Men Highly Vulnerable to HIV: Study

HealthDay – 1 hr 23 mins ago FRIDAY, July 20 (HealthDay News) -- New research pinpoints a major reason why gay and bisexual men remain so vulnerable to the AIDS epidemic: When it comes to the transmission of HIV, a man who has unprotected anal intercourse is at especially high risk.

In fact, if that kind of intercourse was only as risky as vaginal intercourse, researchers report, HIV cases among gay and bisexual men would shrink dramatically. It would go down even more, they added, if their rates of casual sex declined.

The reality, however, is much different. "Everywhere we looked, HIV is expanding both in high- and low-income countries among men who have sex with men," said study author Dr. Chris Beyrer, director of the Johns Hopkins Fogarty AIDS International Training and Research Program.

The experts were quick to note that, worldwide, it is heterosexual men and women who are by far the majority of those who are infected with HIV. Still, more than 30 years into the AIDS epidemic, gay and bisexual men remain especially vulnerable to infection despite a heavy emphasis on condoms and HIV testing; these men make up the bulk of HIV cases in the United States and other Western countries.

According to UNAIDS, HIV is more common among gay and bisexual men than adults in general in all areas of the world, even Africa. In North America, an estimated 15 percent of gay and bisexual men are infected with HIV; the rate is the highest, 25 percent, in the Caribbean.

Previous research has shown that being on the receiving end of anal intercourse is equally risky whether you're a man or a woman. The risk was estimated at 1.4 percent per sex act with an infected person -- about 18 times more risky than male-to-female vaginal intercourse.

The study authors estimate that if receptive anal intercourse were only as risky as vaginal intercourse, HIV cases would fall by 80 percent to 98 percent among gay and bisexual men over five years. They also estimate that cases would fall by 29 percent to 51 percent if more gay and bisexual men had sex in long-term relationships instead of casual encounters.

The findings appear in the July 20 issue of The Lancet, along with several other studies that examine the prevalence of HIV -- the virus that causes AIDS -- in gay and bisexual men and offer suggestions about prevention.

Two studies examined the higher risk of HIV infection among black men.

One study found that black gay and bisexual men outside Africa are much more likely to be HIV-positive than the general population and other blacks. The other found that black gay and bisexual men in the United States were more likely to be infected with HIV than other gay and bisexual men, but less likely to have a history of substance abuse. If infected, they were also less likely to have started to take life-extending drugs that fight HIV.

There were other differences: black men were less likely to have access to medical care and more likely to have sex with other black men.

What to do? Another study suggests the greater use of prevention approaches -- such as condoms, more medical treatment for those who are already infected and use of medication that prevent infection -- could shrink new HIV cases among gay and bisexual men by one-fourth over the next decade. "But it's not simple as choosing the best ones. There are existing technologies, but we need to put them together" and expand them, said Dr. Patrick S. Sullivan, an associate professor at Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health.

It's also important, he said, to change societies that stigmatize homosexuality and turn it into a criminal offense.

More information

For more about AIDS, try the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

View the Original article

HPV Might Raise Risk of Form of Skin Cancer

HealthDay – 1 hr 23 mins ago FRIDAY, July 20 (HealthDay News) -- Infection with cutaneous human papillomavirus (HPV) is linked to a type of skin cancer known as squamous cell carcinoma, according to a new study.

Risk factors for squamous cell carcinoma include exposure to the sun's harmful ultraviolet radiation, older age, light skin and a suppressed immune system. The international group of researchers found that having antibodies to certain types of cutaneous HPV may be an additional risk factor for this common form of skin cancer.

"Squamous cell carcinoma of the skin is the second most frequently occurring cancer among Caucasians in the United States, and the numbers of cases continue to rise," study author Dana Rollison, vice president and chief health information officer at Moffitt Cancer Center, in Tampa, Fla., said in a Moffitt news release.

Cutaneous (skin) HPV infection is different from the HPV infection associated with cervical cancer, the release pointed out.

The study investigated the links between cutaneous HPV antibodies in the blood and HPV infection in skin tumors.

The researchers tested 159 tissue samples with squamous cell carcinoma for the presence of cutaneous HPV infection. They found the skin cancer was significantly associated with antibodies to three different types of cutaneous HPV.

Additional links were found between antibodies to two other types of cutaneous HPV when compared to blood samples from people without skin cancer, according to the researchers.

Some experts argue that infection with a certain form of cutaneous HPV interferes with the repair of DNA in sun-damaged skin and could predispose people to squamous cell cancer, the release noted.

"We hope that this study, aimed at identifying the role of cutaneous HPV infection in

View the Original article

Neanderthals May Have Self-Medicated

Scientific American – 1 hr 28 mins ago Click here to listen to this podcast

You might picture Neanderthals as cavemen gnawing on bones around a campfire. Which wouldn't be inaccurate. But Neanderthals may have also dined on roasted vegetables and known a bit about medicinal plants too. So says a study in the journal Naturwissenschaften (The Science of Nature).

View the Original article

Alarming Whooping Cough Rates May Hit a Record High

she said, adding that the country may see record high pertussis rates this year. Nine deaths from whooping cough have been reported this year so far among roughly 18,000 cases that have reported to the CDC.

Schuchat said a number of factors are driving the increase. The disease is cyclical, she noted, with peaks and valleys that happen about every three to five years. Immunity to the vaccine could diminish over time. A rise in diagnoses and reporting of cases may influence the data as well.

Schuchat stopped short of blaming vaccine delayers and abstainers for the increase in cases. She said she’s aware of pockets around the country with large numbers of unvaccinated people, but added,

View the Original article

Autumn Birthday Ups Odds of Living to 100: Study

HealthDay – 1 hr 23 mins ago THURSDAY, July 19 (HealthDay News) -- You may think of your birthday as only being important to your age and the possible presence of candles, cards and cake, but a new study suggests a link between your month of birth and longevity.

Researchers found that those who were born between September and November from the years 1880 to 1895 were more likely to reach the 100-year mark than their siblings who were born in March. The study does not prove a cause-and-effect link, just an association.

The meaning of the findings is unclear, and a researcher who studies lifespan called them mostly irrelevant to modern times.

But, Leonid Gavrilov, from the Center on Aging at the University of Chicago, who wrote the study with his wife, Natalia Gavrilova, said the findings point to the importance of the environment in which a child is conceived and later grows.

"We believe that avoiding any potential sources of damage to developing fetus and child may have significant effects on health in later life and longevity," Gavrilov said. "Childhood living conditions may have long-lasting consequences for health in later life and longevity."

The researchers looked at 1,574 centenarians -- people who reached the age of 100 -- in the United States. They found that those people born between September and November had about a 40 percent higher chance of living to 100 than those born in March.

Of course, the chances that people born in 1889-1895 would even reach the century mark was very low to begin with. Of those born in 1900 who were still alive at 50, just a third of 1 percent of men made it to 100, and just shy of 2 percent of women accomplished the feat, Gavrilov said.

Why might month of birth -- or month of conception -- affect how long someone lives? One possibility is that seasonal diseases played a role, Gavrilov said.

S. Jay Olshansky, a professor of public health at the University of Illinois at Chicago who's familiar with the findings, said the study is not newsworthy. "The results are probably valid, but largely irrelevant in our modern world since they apply to birth months from more than a century ago."

Regardless of the month someone was born or conceived, the odds are slim that you'll live to be 100. "This prospect has been rising through the 20th century, but not dramatically," Olshansky said.

At best, he said, "this research might offer a partial and extremely small explanation for a small fraction of why some people conceived and born more than a century ago lived for 100 years."

What does all this mean for your chances of living to 100 if you were born around the fall or -- perhaps less luckily -- in March? Good question -- and one that won't be answered until people around your age start hitting the century mark.

The study appeared in the Journal of Aging Research.

More information

For more about healthy aging, try the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

View the Original article

Health Tip: Is My Blood Glucose Too Low?

HealthDay – 1 hr 23 mins ago (HealthDay News) -- Hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) is a common complication of diabetes, and can occur even in people whose diabetes is well-managed.

Although the condition isn't always preventable, the American Diabetes Association says diabetics and their loved ones should recognize the warning signs. The ADA offers this list of potential symptoms:

Feeling dizzy or shaking.Sweating and having pale skin.Developing a headache.Feeling hungry.Showing sudden changes in behavior.Moving clumsily.Having a seizure.Feeling confused or having difficulty paying attention.Feeling a "tingling" sensation around the mouth.

View the Original article

Kyprolis Approved for Multiple Myeloma

HealthDay – 1 hr 23 mins ago FRIDAY, July 20 (HealthDay News) -- Kyprolis (carfilzomib) has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat certain people with multiple myeloma who have already been given at least two prior therapies.

Multiple myeloma is a form of cancer that arises from blood plasma, usually starting in the bone marrow, the agency said in a news release. More than 21,000 people in the United States are expected to be diagnosed with the disease this year, and about 10,700 will die from it, the American Cancer Society estimates.

Kyprolis has been approved for people treated previously with the anti-cancer drug bortezomib, and an immunomodulatory therapy such as thalidomide.

The most common side effects observed during clinical testing of Kyprolis included fatigue, low blood cell counts, low platelet counts, diarrhea and fever. More serious but less common adverse reactions included heart failure and shortness of breath, the FDA said.

Kyprolis is marketed by San Francisco-based Onyx Pharmaceuticals.

More information

Medline Plus has more about multiple myeloma.

View the Original article

Simple Measures May Curb Excessive Weight Gain in Pregnancy

HealthDay – 1 hr 23 mins ago FRIDAY, July 20 (HealthDay News) -- Healthy eating and low or moderate levels of exercise during pregnancy can help a woman avoid excessive weight gain and may reduce her infant's risk of being overweight or obese later in life, new research indicates.

The study included 49 women at 16 to 20 weeks of pregnancy who were assigned to either a low- or moderate-intensity walking program. Both groups also followed a meal plan based on guidelines given to expectant mothers with gestational diabetes.

The women were compared with another group of pregnant women who were not assigned to any exercise or diet programs (the "control" group).

All the women in the study were deemed to have a normal, healthy weight before their pregnancy, the researchers noted in the report, which was published in the August issue of the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise.

Compared to the women in the control group, those in the two exercise/healthy-eating groups gained less weight during pregnancy and were less likely to gain excessive weight, the investigators found. Within two months of delivery, 28 percent of women in the moderate-intensity exercise program were within about 4.4 pounds of their pre-pregnancy weight, compared with 7 percent of those in the control group.

Babies born to women in all the groups had similar birth weights, which suggests that preventing excessive weight gain during pregnancy does not influence infant birth weight, the study authors noted in a news release from the American College of Sports Medicine.

The researchers pointed out, however, that pregnancy is an important period in determining a child's health later in life and preventing excessive weight gain in pregnancy may reduce a child's long-term risk for obesity.

"Women benefit greatly from being active throughout their pregnancies and physical activity is strongly recommended by professional organizations," lead author Stephanie-May Ruchat, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Western Ontario in Canada, said in the news release. "However, most pregnant women remain inactive and this may be contributing to excessive gestational weight gain, which is associated with an increased risk for future obesity in both the mother and offspring."

"Myths about nutrition in pregnancy can also be misleading. For example, mothers-to-be should be warned that 'eating for two' does not mean they need to eat twice as much, but that they should eat twice as healthy," Ruchat noted. "An increase of only 200 to 500 kilocalories per day in the second and third trimester is recommended, depending on the body-mass index of the women prior to pregnancy. The heavier the woman is, the fewer extra calories per day she will need during pregnancy."

Before beginning any new diet or exercise regimen, experts recommend discussing it with your doctor or other health professional.

More information

The Nemours Foundation offers tips for staying healthy during pregnancy.

View the Original article