News headlines

A selection of news stories which have appeared since 1 March 2003.

Major PI-sparing study closes Trizivir arm due to inferiority to efavirenz arms

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1954

The US Department of Health and Human Services has written to HIV health care providers in the United States to inform them that an interim analysis of the ACTG A5095 study has found that patients who received Trizivir (AZT/3TC/abacavir) were significantly more likely to experience virological failure after an average of 32 weeks than participants randomised to receive either AZT/3TC/efavirenz or AZT/3TC/abacavir/efavirenz.

AIDS dissident appointment 'last straw' in battle of activists and South African Health Minister

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1955

The Treatment Action Campaign has called for the removal of South African Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang for inviting an infamous AIDS dissident, Robert Giraldo, to become an adviser to her government on nutrition for people with AIDS. Giraldo believes that nutritional deficiencies, and antiretroviral drugs, are the cause of AIDS, rather than HIV.

Hepatitis not HAART causing serious liver toxicity in HIV patients

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1952

Severe liver inflammation and liver failure in people taking HAART is due to the effects of infection with hepatitis C or B, rather than the toxicities of anti-HIV drugs, according to a study conducted at the University of Brescia [Italy] and published in the March 2003 edition of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes.

Diabetes risk increased threefold in HIV-positive women treated with PI

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1950

HIV-positive women taking protease inhibitors are three times more likely to develop diabetes than HIV-positive women on non-protease inhibitor combinations or HIV-negative women, according to a US study published in the March 2003 edition of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes.

UNAIDS and UNIFEM launch new website to address gender dimensions of HIV epidemic

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1948

Last month the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), in association with the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) have launched a new gender and HIV/AIDS web portal (www.genderandaids.org) to provide researchers, policy-makers and practitioners access to cutting edge information.

High HIV viral load in breast milk within 14 days of delivery increases chances of infecting infant

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1946

HIV viral load in breast milk is highest during the first 14 days of lactation, and mother-to-baby transmission of HIV is most likely to occur during this period, according to a study published in 1st March 2003 edition of the Journal of Infectious Diseases. These findings are being hailed as "unique" by the study authors.

Good adherence predicts lipodystrophy in Italian cohort

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1943

Italian researchers have shown that people who adhered better to their antiretroviral therapy were at much higher risk of developing body fat alterations than people who did not always take their medication at the prescribed intervals, in a study published online this week by the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes in a special supplement on adherence to anti-HIV therapy.

HIV lipodystrophy case definition: full details published

http://www.aidsmap.com/news/newsdisplay2.asp?newsId=1942

A lipodystrophy case definition developed by a working party convened by the European Medicines Evaluation Agency has been published in the March 1 edition of The Lancet.