News (Updated January 12,
2003)
[Home]
[previous news]
|
Tue Jan 7, 1:43 PM ET
|
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Powerful AIDS drug combinations known as highly-active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) are equally effective in patients regardless of race or ethnicity, report researchers.
The results contradict those of previous studies showing that these and other factors, such as age and income, may influence how well a person responds to HAART.
But according to the current report, language barriers, different health beliefs, the stigmatization of HIV-infected individuals and other factors may affect the use of medication.
To investigate, researchers reviewed data on 389 whites and 135 non-whites older than 15 living in Denmark, which has a national health care system. One year after receiving a prescription for HAART, there were no differences in the viral load, or levels of HIV in the blood, between the two groups of patients, report researchers in the December 15 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases.
"Race and ethnic origin play no major role in the outcome associated with HAART if access to health care is free," conclude Dr. Soren Jensen-Fangel and colleagues from Aarhus University in Denmark.
They explain that US studies showing that a person's racial or ethnic background affects the response to treatment are probably not accounting for economic status.
"Non-white background will be closely linked to relatively poorer access to health care" in the US and similar countries without a national health care system, Jensen-Fangel and colleagues explain. "Access to health care and antiretroviral treatment is free in Denmark--that is, the outcome is not affected by the financial status of the patient per se."
The study also found that nonwhite patients were more likely to delay initiation of their treatment, for reasons that are not clear.
"An increasing number of patients with HIV infection in Denmark will be of nonwhite origin, and the health care system will have to implement treatment programs for this group to avoid delay in the receipt of treatment," researchers conclude.
SOURCE: Clinical Infectious Diseases 2002;35:1541-1548.
|
Tue Jan 7, 1:46 PM ET
|
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - New research from India provides more evidence that a small percentage of people can evade infection with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, despite repeated exposure to the virus.
In a study of prostitutes in India, women who had been repeatedly exposed to HIV without becoming infected themselves had normal pregnancies and gave birth to healthy babies. Neither the babies nor the mothers became HIV-positive during the study.
Researchers are not sure how the women have been able to stay HIV-negative, but they suggest that some people may have some sort of natural immunity against the virus.
Several studies have found that a small number of people who are exposed to HIV over and over again never test positive for the virus. Either their body does not produce antibodies in response to HIV infection or they do not become infected at all.
In the current study, a team led by Dr. Rachana M. Chibber of King Faisal University in Al-Khobar, Saudi Arabia, identified 98 prostitutes who, despite routinely having unprotected sex with many clients, remained HIV-negative for at least three years. Fifty-four of these women, who were all sex workers in Manipur, India, became pregnant.
The effect of pregnancy on a woman's ability to avoid HIV infection is uncertain. So the researchers followed the pregnant prostitutes and compared them to 58 pregnant women living in the same city who were also HIV-negative, but who were not sex workers.
Pregnancy and childbirth were similar for both groups of women, according to a report in last month's issue of the Journal of Reproductive Medicine. Women in both groups remained healthy during pregnancy, and their children were born healthy and HIV-negative.
The effect of pregnancy on HIV infection remains uncertain, according to the investigators. They point out that some studies have shown that pregnancy speeds the progression to AIDS for HIV-positive women, but other studies have not.
What this study shows, according to the researchers, is that there are some people who seem to be protected from HIV infection. Rather than having an HIV infection that failed to show up on lab tests, these prostitutes appeared to have some sort of "natural protective immunity" to the virus, according to the report.
SOURCE: Journal of Reproductive Medicine 2003;47:1016-1020.