Smoking and lung cancer
An important theme of the recent Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI 2015) in Seattle, USA, was the impact of smoking on the health of people living with HIV. As HIV treatment has improved, it’s been shown that smoking doubles the risk of death for people living with HIV and actually causes more early deaths of HIV-positive people than HIV itself. These deaths are caused by lung cancer, other cancers, heart attacks, strokes and liver disease.
Editors' picks from other sources
Nigel Farage and Steven Woolfe at odds over Ukip's stance on terminally ill immigrants
from Huffington Post
Nigel Farage set out Ukip's "common sense" stance towards immigrants in an interview on Wednesday, saying: "We want people who haven't got a life threatening illness." Hours later, he restated his position in his keynote speech on the party's immigration policy, echoing his position last year to stop immigrants with HIV coming to Britain. However, Ukip MEP Steven Woolfe, who has previously said that he was interested in succeeding Farage as leader, insisted that the party would not "turn away" people with life-threatening illnesses like cancer.
Gilead's Harvoni gains NICE yes – but won't face funding delay
from PM Live
Gilead's next generation hepatitis C pill Harvoni is set to be backed by NICE – and this time NHS England won't be delaying its funding as it has done with the firm's other hep C drug Sovaldi.
Two strains of HIV cut vastly different paths
from New York Times
It’s now clear, researchers say, that HIV originated in humans on 13 separate occasions, evolving in humans from ancestral viruses that infected monkeys, chimpanzees and gorillas.
Are women PrePared?
from Speaking Up! (blog)
Can PrEP just be provided to men who have sex with men in the UK? What about others? What about other vulnerable populations, such as black women and migrants? What about trans women? All the data we have here in the UK is about men who have sex with men, and this worries me.
HIV treatment finally has a game-changer, and it’s called Truvada
from The Guardian
The widely reported Proud study shows just how effective pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) can be at preventing HIV transmission. PrEP is, quite simply, a game-changer and represents a wake-up call for the government, NHS England and local authorities to make PrEP a key component in our strategy to defeat HIV.