Tag Archives: HIV

Setback In HIV Cure Research

Via Johns Hopkins: Just when some scientists were becoming more hopeful about finding a strategy to outwit HIV’s ability to resist, evade and otherwise survive efforts to rid it from the body, another hurdle has emerged to foil their plans, new research from Johns Hopkins shows. In a cover-story report on the research to be published in the journal Cell …

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CANADA: British Columbia To Launch HIV Test With 14-Day Post-Infection Result

The Vancouver Sun reports: British Columbia will be the first province in Canada to use a more accurate HIV detection test that has greatly improved the diagnosis of early or acute HIV infection. The new test, which will be utilized provincially following the results of a study led by the B.C. Centre for Disease Control, detects the virus as soon …

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NYC Woman Sues Over HIV Ad

Claiming that she never signed a release, a Brooklyn woman has filed suit against the stock photography company Getty Images after she appeared in an HIV awareness campaign published by the state of New York. The woman’s lawyer says that the state will also be sued. Avril Nolan, 25, a Greenpoint resident who does not have HIV, alleged through her …

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CALIFORNIA: Pharma-Vs-Pharma Lawsuit May Hinge On Kicking Off Gay Juror

Drug giant Abbott raised the price on its HIV med Norvir by 400% in 2007, just before SmithKline launched its own combination drug that includes Norvir. Therefore, lawsuit. But the case may now hinge on whether it was legal for Abbott to challenge one of the jurors because he is gay. “It’s a big deal,” said Vik Amar, University of …

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ARKANSAS: School Suspends Three Siblings Until They Prove They Aren’t HIV+

Arkansas television reports that a local school district won’t let three siblings return to classes until their foster parents provide documentation proving that the children are not HIV+. “The actions taken by the Superintendent of Pea Ridge School District are appalling and is reminiscent of times past and the case of Ryan White,” says Tom Masseau, Executive Director of the …

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Today’s Gay Etiquette Question

From Steven Petrow’s Civil Behavior column in the New York Times comes this question: Q. Dear Civil Behavior: I’d like your advice in coming out as H.I.V. positive to friends and colleagues. I’m married to a wonderful man, 51, and have lived quite well with the virus for 15 years. I believe it’s important for the many others still finding …

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HIV Decriminalization Bill Advances

Via Poz Magazine: The U.S. House Appropriations Committee has passed an HIV criminalization amendment to a funding bill, according to a statement by the Sero Project. U.S. Representative Barbara Lee (D–Calif.) offered the amendment to the Commerce, Justice, Science Appropriations bill for fiscal year 2014. The amendment would require the attorney general to initiate a review of federal and state …

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Greece Reinstates Forced HIV Testing

Greece’s new minister of health has reinstated a measure that allows the police to detain and test any person for HIV. Health organisations say the decree stigmatises drug users, sex workers and undocumented migrants in particular. The text also states that any occupants of housing which “may cause danger to public health” should be evicted from their homes, without any …

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NYT Reports On Aging With HIV

The New York Times has published a look at the growing population of older people living with HIV and the health challenges they face. This group of almost 50,000 men and women moving through middle age is a living science experiment, entering medical and psychological territories that are largely uncharted. What are the consequences of long-term exposure to the virus, …

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Dan Savage On Getting Tested

“How do you go about asking somebody you’ve just started dating to get tested without sounding rude?”

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Rep. Barbara Lee Reintroduces Bill To Repeal HIV Criminalization Laws

Yesterday Rep. Barbara Lee reintroduced a bill that could eventually force the repeal of laws that criminalize exposing others to HIV.  Lee first introduced the bill in 2011.  Lambda Legal has issued a press release in support of the bill. The REPEAL (“Repeal Existing Policies that Encourage and Allow Legal”) HIV Discrimination Act calls for review of all federal and …

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Study: Gay Men Report Fewer Partners

According to a study released last month, gay men report having fewer sex partners even though the rates of HIV infection and other STDs have risen. The mean number of male sexual partners MSM reported in the previous year fell significantly from 2.9 to 2.3 between the two surveys (p = 0.035) and was more marked in men under 24 …

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AIDS Group Slams Danish “Cure” Report

Treatment Action Group has a lot of problems with yesterday’s story about a possible HIV cure presently under research in Denmark. Sadly, it seems that one of the authors of the Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics review, Dr. Ole Søgaard, has rather shot himself in the foot by contributing to a wildly irresponsible article in the UK newspaper the Daily Telegraph …

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DENMARK: Possible HIV Cure Soon?

Danish researchers say they are on the brink of curing HIV via a treatment that seeks out the elusive reservoirs of the virus unreachable by traditional anti-retroviral medications.  Via Britain’s Telegraph: Danish scientists are expecting results that will show that “finding a mass-distributable and affordable cure to HIV is possible.” They are conducting clinical trials to test a “novel strategy” …

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NEW YORK CITY: Harlem Group Begins Study On HIV Prevention Using Truvada

Over the objections of some activists, in July 2012 the FDA approved the use of Truvada as a daily HIV preventive for some high-risk populations. Harlem Prevention Center has launched a study which will evaluate if taking the drug less frequently will also be effective. Via press release: HPTN 067, also known as The ADAPT Study, is a unique study …

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TODAY: Youth HIV Awareness Day

Via press release: In the United States, one in four new HIV infections is among youth ages 13 to 24. Every month 1,000 young people are infected with HIV and over 76,400 young people are currently living with HIV across the country. Young people and their allies are determined to end this epidemic once and for all – but they …

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SOUTH AFRICA: Government To Offer Combination HIV Med For $10 Per Month

In what is being called a revolutionary development in the treatment of HIV, the South African government will begin offering a daily three-in-one anti-retroviral pill that will cost only $10 per month. In South Africa, where 5.6 million people live with HIV/AIDS, treatment options were bleak at best — until now. The country has announced a new regimen that combines …

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KANSAS: Legislature Considers Bill That Calls For Quarantining The HIV+

The Kansas legislature is expected to pass a bill that provides for quarantining people living with HIV and AIDS. This story is NOT from thirty years ago. The bill is allegedly meant to help emergency response workers (firefighters, EMTs, etc) who presently must get a court order to test the blood of patients to whom they have been exposed. Kansas …

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FRANCE: Researchers Claim Early HIV Drugs Functionally Cures One In Ten

Researchers at France’s Institute Pasteur claim that early HIV drug treatment may functionally cure about 10% of the newly infected. Their report follows similar news out of the United States, where an toddler remains HIV-free after robust early treatment as an infant. The French study only involves a small number of patients. Dr Asier Saez-Cirion, from the Institute Pasteur in …

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Bee Venom Kills HIV

Interesting research out of Washington University. Nanoparticles carrying a toxin found in bee venom can destroy human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) while leaving surrounding cells unharmed, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have shown. The finding is an important step toward developing a vaginal gel that may prevent the spread of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. …

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