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Scientists urge early testing for AIDS
Source: Agencies |
February 22, 2010, Monday
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AGGRESSIVE, early anti-viral therapy might provide a way to derail the spread of AIDS, a battle where a successful vaccine remains elusive.
Called "test-and-treat," the goal is to catch new AIDS cases early and administer therapy to reduce the amount of virus in patients in an effort to prevent them spreading the illness, a meeting in San Diego, California, was told.
While anti-retroviral therapy has increased in the past five years it has often been given too late. By the time people start therapy they have infected most of those that they would have infected anyway, Brian Williams of the South African Centre for Epidemiological Modelling and Analysis told the annual meeting on the American Association for the Advancement of Science on Saturday.
The National Institutes of Health is now looking at testing the strategy in the United States.
Some 40 million people are infected with HIV/AIDS worldwide and the plague continues to spread, researchers said.
"The problem is we are using drugs to save lives, we're not using them to prevent infection," Williams said. Much of the spread of the infection is by people who are not yet aware they have the virus.
Even in the US, 20 percent to 25 percent of infected people don't know it, added Dr Kenneth Mayer of Brown University. They can be highly infectious if they engage in risky behavior, he said.
Aggressively testing people for HIV and then launching treatment with anti-retroviral drugs could set up a roadblock to the spread, Williams said.
Early treatment can reduce the load of virus in the blood to one ten-thousandth of what it would be otherwise. Such a drop makes the carrier just one-twenty-fifth as likely to pass on the infection, Williams said.
Called "test-and-treat," the goal is to catch new AIDS cases early and administer therapy to reduce the amount of virus in patients in an effort to prevent them spreading the illness, a meeting in San Diego, California, was told.
While anti-retroviral therapy has increased in the past five years it has often been given too late. By the time people start therapy they have infected most of those that they would have infected anyway, Brian Williams of the South African Centre for Epidemiological Modelling and Analysis told the annual meeting on the American Association for the Advancement of Science on Saturday.
The National Institutes of Health is now looking at testing the strategy in the United States.
Some 40 million people are infected with HIV/AIDS worldwide and the plague continues to spread, researchers said.
"The problem is we are using drugs to save lives, we're not using them to prevent infection," Williams said. Much of the spread of the infection is by people who are not yet aware they have the virus.
Even in the US, 20 percent to 25 percent of infected people don't know it, added Dr Kenneth Mayer of Brown University. They can be highly infectious if they engage in risky behavior, he said.
Aggressively testing people for HIV and then launching treatment with anti-retroviral drugs could set up a roadblock to the spread, Williams said.
Early treatment can reduce the load of virus in the blood to one ten-thousandth of what it would be otherwise. Such a drop makes the carrier just one-twenty-fifth as likely to pass on the infection, Williams said.
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