Drugs Causing Other Diseases

This is the Black Box warning for VIDEX

PANCREATITIS, LACTIC ACIDOSIS and HEPATOMEGALY with STEATOSIS

Fatal and nonfatal pancreatitis has occurred during therapy with VIDEX used alone or in combination regimens in both treatment-naive and treatment-experienced patients, regardless of degree of immunosuppression. VIDEX should be suspended in patients with suspected pancreatitis and discontinued in patients with confirmed pancreatitis [see WARNINGS AND PRECAUTIONS].

Lactic acidosis and severe hepatomegaly with steatosis, including fatal cases, have been reported with the use of nucleoside analogues alone or in combination, including didanosine and other antiretrovirals. Fatal lactic acidosis has been reported in pregnant women who received the combination of didanosine and stavudine with other antiretroviral agents. The combination of didanosine and stavudine should be used with caution during pregnancy and is recommended only if the potential benefit clearly outweighs the potential risk [see WARNINGS AND PRECAUTIONS].

In January of this year the FDA announced its concern about the problems caused by this drug, discovered only from a review of adverse reaction reports in post marketing data.

from MedPage Today

FDA Revises HIV Drug Label for Liver Complication By Cole Petrochko, Staff Writer, MedPage Today Published: January 31, 2010 WASHINGTON -- The FDA has updated labels of the HIV drug didanosine (Videx and Videx EC) to include warnings for potentially serious liver damage. Although these cases are rare, the drug may cause noncirrhotic hypertension in patients, a potentially fatal complication which the FDA discovered through 42 postmarket, adverse event reports. Of those patients, three required liver transplant and four died. Two deaths were caused by esophageal hemorrhage, while two more were caused by progressive liver failure. One patient suffered multiorgan failure, cerebral hemorrhage, sepsis, and lactic acidosis. The FDA said in a statement that it chose not to recall the drug because it believes its benefits outweigh potential risks, but advised that treatment decisions be made on an individual basis between healthcare professionals and patients. The agency added that causal association is difficult to determine in postmarket reports, but that alternative causes of the hypertension were ruled out in well-documented cases. Healthcare professionals who determine didanosine is effective in treating a patient should monitor that patient for the development of portal hypertension and esophageal varices, the agency said. Didanosine is used in combination with other HIV medications to help maintain CD4 cells in patients. The drug already has a black box warning for lactic acidosis and hepatomegaly with steatosis. Like the antiretroviral agents hydroxyurea and ribavirin, didanosine has been associated with the development of liver toxicity.

World AIDS Day: activists and HIV-positive children and adults mark December 1

HIV/AIDS cure getting little publicity

WASHINGTON, Nov. 30 (UPI) -- Efforts of the Obama administration to address HIV/AIDS are the focus of remarks in Washington by officials Monday, the eve of World AIDS Day, officials said.

The event by the officials was to be delivered live and online at WhiteHouse.gov/live, the White House said.


Participants include Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Ambassador and U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator Eric P. Goosby, and senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, assistant to the president for intergovernmental affairs and public engagement.


World AIDS Day, observed Dec. 1 each year, is dedicated to raising awareness of the AIDS pandemic caused by the spread of HIV infection, the virus that causes AIDS.

http://naturalhealthnews.blogspot.com/2008/12/different-approach-needed-for-aids.html

http://naturalhealthnews.blogspot.com/2008/11/politics-hivaids-and-gmo-drugs.html

http://naturalhealthnews.blogspot.com/2007/10/politics-and-hivaids-mos.html

http://naturalhealthnews.blogspot.com/2008/04/hivaids-drugs-and-monitoring-scheme.html

http://naturalhealthnews.blogspot.com/2009/03/coconut-oil-components-compound-hiv.html

12/1/09: World AIDS Day: AIDS faces funding drop

With funding an issue it seems as if a new approach to these troublesome health issues would be welcome.  There are natural treatment approaches for HIV/AIDS, drug resistan TB and Malaria. 

Try thinking outside the box for a while, it might do so much more than keep research-that-goes-nowhere going.

CONGERS, N.Y., Dec. 1 (UPI) -- On World AIDS Day Tuesday, a day devoted to raising awareness, U.S. researchers point out the world could face a funding shortfall for treatment.

The policy journal Health Affairs devoted much of its November/December edition to the cost and demand challenges of HIV/AIDS. Over the next several years, the world could face a funding shortfall that would prevent millions more with human immunodeficiency virus/AIDS from gaining access to antiretroviral drugs, the journal said.
However,over the long-term, the world could also take critical steps to slash the global burden of HIV-AIDS -- and the costs of battling the pandemic -- by half.
During the past six years, the world has poured $52 billion into fighting the HIV/AIDS pandemic and more than 4 million people with the disease worldwide are being treated. But the rapid growth in AIDS treatment has not kept pace with the rate of new infections.

A total of 11 million people are sick enough that they should be on anti-AIDS treatment, but aren't, and with an estimated 33 million infected, the number needing treatment will only grow in the years ahead, academic journal Health Affairs said.

The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria needs $3 billion to help run the programs it currently funds. Over the next year, however, the organization will be another $2 billion short of its goal for funding new programs.

HIV/AIDS Risk to Vets

Standards at nationwide VA facilities seem to be running at an all time low. This latest incident puts not only the lives of over 3000 veterans at risk, but perhaps the lives of their families.

What also concerns me is the lack of attention to natural treatment that is able to stop the transmission of HIV to AIDS, and other therapy outside the use of anti-retrovirals that have severe health risks of their own.

HIV Risk To 3,000 Vets From Non Disinfected Pumps At VA Hospital In Miami
24 Mar 2009

Over 3,000 veterans who had routine tests at Miami's VA Medical Center are thought to be at slight risk of infection from hepatitis or HIV because the hospital discovered that a section of tube used in water pumps for colonoscopies and other gastrointestinal procedures was only being rinsed and not disinfected.

A hospital announcement on Monday, reported in the Miami Herald and other local media, said officials have sent letters to over 2,500 veterans, and are still trying to trace another 700. 3,260 patients are thought to be at risk altogether.

John Vara, chief of staff of the Miami VA Health Care System, told the press that during an internal safety review they discovered on 4 March that a part of the equipment used in colonoscopies and other gastrointestinal procedures was not being disinfected, only rinsed. This was contrary to the manufacturer's recommendation, he said.

It was an alert from the manufacturer that caused the hospital to carry out the safety review, reported the South Florida Sun Sentinel.

Vara said that a length of tube attached to a pump that is used with a type of endoscope was not being cleaned and disinfected, although the endoscope itself (the tube containing a fiber optic camera that goes inside the patient) was.

The risk comes from infection caused by the slight chance of backflow, although the pump itself does not come into contact with the patient.

Vara said there was no evidence that any of the patients had been infected, and although the risk of infection is low, he said "any risk is unacceptable", reported the Miami Herald.

There have been other incidents recently of vets being put at risk of serious infection from incorrect hospital procedures, said the Herald.

In February about 6,400 vets at a VA center in Tennessee were told to get blood tests after equipment used in colonoscopies had not been handled properly, and another center in Augusta Georgia found that more than 1,800 vets were put at risk due to non-sterile use of ear, nose and throat instruments.

According to the South Florida Sun Sentinel, Vara said they don't know why the manufacturer's recommendations for disinfecting the tube were not followed.

A patient safety expert told the paper that the risk of exposure is likely to be very small and most patients were exposed a long time ago and are most likely out of danger.

However, another said it was still important to investigate how the error came about and make sure it doesn't happen again. You don't want to alarm people, but you need to know what went wrong and how to fix it, said Dr Anthony Silvagni, who chairs a safety group and is dean at the Nova Southeastern University health sciences division.

Democratic member for Miami of the US House of Representatives, Kendrick Meek, has written to Eric K Shinseki, Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs, and VA inspector general George Opfer, urging them to order an investigation, and he also wants a door to door campaign to alert all veterans who might be at risk.

In his letter to them Meek said it was "stomach-turning" that veterans have to face this situation and visit Special Care Clinics for blood tests, reported the Sentinel.

The VA have set up special care clinics in the Miami VA, the Broward County VA Clinic, the Homestead VA Clinic and the Key West VA Clinic to screen patients who may be infected.

Concerned patients may call the 24 hour Miami VA hotline on 305-575-7256 or toll free on 1-877-575-7256.

Sources: Miami Herald, South Florida Sun Sentinel.

Written by: Catharine Paddock, PhD
Copyright: Medical News Today
Article URL: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/143427.php

Coconut Oil Components Confound HIV Charge

I have for quite a number of years volunteered for the Medical Advisory Board at Keep Hope Alive.

KHA has been a forerunner in the education of thousands internationally about building immunity, especially when it comes to HIV and AIDS. They publish Positive Health News, and I placed an excerpt here about lauric acid which they published in 1997.

It seems to have taken a heck of a long time for mainstream medicine to catch on.

MARY ENIG Ph.D. ON NATURAL COCONUT OIL FOR AIDS and OTHER VIRAL INFECTIONS On July 19, 1995, Enig was quoted in an article published in The HINDU, India’s National Newspaper as stating that coconut oil is converted by the body into “Monolaurin” a fatty acid with anti-viral properties that might be useful in the treatment of AIDS. The staff reporter for The HINDU wrote about Enig’s presentation at a press conference in Kochi and wrote the following:

“There was an instance in the US in which an infant tested HIV positive had become HIV negative. That it was fed with an infant formula with a high coconut oil content gains significance in this context and at present an effort was on to find out how the “viral load” of an HIV infected baby came down when fed a diet that helped in the generation of Monolaurin in the body.”

The reporter commented on Enig’s observations that “Monolaurin helped in inactivating other viruses such as measles, herpes, vesicular stomatitis and Cytomegalovirus (CMV) and that research undertaken so far on coconut oil also indicated that it offered a certain measure of protection against cancer-inducing substances. "

In another article published in the Indian Coconut Journal, Sept., 1995, Dr. Enig stated:

“Recognition of the antimicrobial activity of the monoglyceride of lauric acid (Monolaurin) has been reported since 1966. The seminal work can be credited to Jon Kabara. This early research was directed at the virucidal effects because of possible problems related to food preservation. Some of the early work by Hierholzer and Kabara (1982) that showed virucidal effects of Monolaurin on enveloped RNA and DNA viruses was done in conjunction with the Center for Disease Control of the US Public Health Service with selected prototypes or recognized strains of enveloped viruses. The envelope of these viruses is a lipid membrane.”

Enig stated in her article that Monolaurin, of which the precursor is lauric acid, disrupted the lipid membranes of envelope viruses and also inactivated bacteria, yeast and fungi. She wrote:“Of the saturated fatty acids, lauric acid has greater antiviral activity than either caprylic acid (C-10) or myristic acid (C-14). The action attributed to Monolaurin is that of solubilizing the lipids ..in the envelope of the virus causing the disintegration of the virus envelope.” In India, coconut oil is fed to calves to treat Cryptosporidium as reported by Lark Lands Ph.D. in her upcoming book “Positively Well” (1).

While HHV-6A was not mentioned by Enig, HHV-6A is an enveloped virus and would be expected to disintegrate in the presence of lauric acid and/or Monolaurin. Some of the pathogens reported by Enig to be inactivated by Monolaurin include HIV, measles, vercular stomatitis virus (VSV), herpes simplex virus (HSV-1), visna, cytomegalovirus (CMV), Influenza virus, Pneumonovirus, Syncytial virus and Rubeola. Some bacteria inactivated by Monolaurin include listeria, Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus agalactiae, Groups A, B, F and G streptococci, Gram-positive organisms; and gram-negative organisms, if treated with chelator.

Enig reported that only one infant formula “Impact” contains lauric acid while the more widely promoted formulas like “Ensure” do not contain lauric acid and often contain some hydrogenated fats (trans fatty acids). A modified ester of lauric acid, Monolaurin (available in capsules), is sold in health food stores and is manufactured by Ecological Formulas, Concord, CA.

ENIG ON A THERAPEUTIC DOSE
Based on her calculations on the amount of lauric acid found in human Mother’s milk, Dr. Enig suggests a rich lauric acid diet would contain about 24 grams of lauric acid daily for the average adult. This amount could be found in about 3.5 tablespoons of coconut oil or 10 ounces of “Pure Coconut Milk.” Coconut Milk is made in Sri Lanka and imported into the United States. It can be found in health food stores and in local grocery stores in the International Foods section or in specialty grocery stores that sell products imported from Thailand, the Philippines or East India. About 7 ounces of raw coconut daily would contain 24 grams of lauric acid. 24 grams of lauric acid is the therapeutic daily dose for adults suggested by Mary Enig based on her research of the lauric acid content of mother’s milk. (1)

1. Positively Well, by Lark Lands Ph.D. Her new book discusses lauric acid and suggests many treatment options for persons with AIDS or CFIDS and may be ordered by calling 905-672-7470 or 800-542-8102

SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH ON THE ANTI-VIRAL EFFECTS OF LAURIC ACID
Mary Enig cites 24 references in her 7 page article on “Lauric Acid for HIV-infected Individuals,” a few of which are as follows:

1. Issacs, C.E. et al. Inactivation of enveloped viruses in human bodily fluids by purified lipids. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1994;724:457-464.

2. Kabara, J.J. Antimicrobial agents derived from fatty acids. Journal of the American Oil Chemists Society 1984;61:397-403.

3. Hierholzer, J.C. and Kabara J.J. In vitro effects on Monolaurin compounds on enveloped RNA and DNA viruses. Journal of Food Safety 1982;4:1-12.

4. Wang, L.L. and Johnson, E.A. Inhibition of Listeria monocytogenes by fatty acids and monoglycerides. Appli Environ Microbiol 1992; 58:624-629.

5. Issacs, C.E. et al. Membrane-disruptive effect of human milk: inactivation of enveloped viruses. Journal of Infectious Diseases 1986;154:966-971.

6. Anti-viral effects of monolaruin. JAQA 1987;2:4-6 7. Issacs C.E. et al. Antiviral and antibacterial lipids in human milk and infant formula feeds. Archives of Disease in Childhood 1990;65:861-864.

Note: Enig’s article in the Indian Coconut Journal has 41 reference cites. To obtain a complete set of both articles she wrote, see our order form on the last page of this newsletter.

Common ingredient offers AIDS protection
By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor
Wed Mar 4, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A cheap ingredient used in ice cream, cosmetics and found in breast milk helps protect monkeys against infection with a virus similar to AIDS and might work to protect women against the virus, researchers reported on Wednesday.

The compound, called glycerol monolaurate, or GML, appears to stop inflammation and helps keep away the cells the AIDS virus usually infects, the researchers said.

While it does not provide 100 percent protection, it might greatly reduce a woman's risk of being infected, and she could use it privately and without hurting her chances of pregnancy, the researchers reported in the journal Nature.

And it costs pennies a dose, Ashley Haase and Pat Schlievert of the University of Minnesota reported.

"For years, people have used the compound as an emulsifying agent in a variety of foods ... it is in breast milk," Schlievert told reporters in a telephone briefing.

GML is being considered as an additive to tampons because it interferes with bacteria, particularly those that can cause a potentially fatal infection called toxic shock syndrome.

If it can be shown to work safely in women, GML might provide the first easy route to a microbicide -- a gel or a cream that women could use vaginally to protect themselves from infection with the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV, which causes AIDS.

HIV infects 33 million people globally and has killed 25 million. It is transmitted sexually, in blood and breast milk. In Africa, it is most commonly passed during heterosexual contact.

PROTECTING WOMEN

AIDS experts say many victims are married women whose husbands will not use condoms and who are often trying to have children. They need a safe and private way to protect themselves.

A microbicide (pronounced my-CROW-buh-side) might also protect men who have sex with men.

Haase and Schlievert's team tested GML, carried in KY jelly, in macaque monkeys. They put the gel into the vaginas of the monkeys and then applied SIV, a monkey version of HIV.

Four out of five monkeys never became infected and tests showed GML affected the immune response.

HIV is particularly hard to fight because it infects the very immune cells the body uses to attack a virus. When HIV infects an area such as the vagina, the CD4 T-cells rush to defend against it. The body sends out signaling chemicals called cytokines to call in more T-cells.

HIV can then infect them all and spread through the body.

GML appears to stop the cytokine call for help and stops so many T-cells from rushing to the area, Haase and Schlievert said. This in turn reduces the opportunity for HIV to take hold.

"This result represents a highly encouraging new lead in the search for an effective microbicide to prevent HIV transmission that meets the criteria of safety, affordability and efficacy," they wrote.

Even if it was only 60 percent effective, such a gel could prevent 2.5 million HIV cases over three years, they said.

They said they plan to study their gel in more monkeys for longer periods of time to ensure the gel is not simply delaying infection rather than preventing it.

(Editing by Will Dunham)Copyright © 2009 Reuters Limited.

Other articles:
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=111339
http://www.lauric.org/

A Different Approach Needed for AIDS

Today is World AIDS Day.

This issue is a very highly charged political issue whether you accept it or not. It is also one that raises hair on the necks of very fundamental religions who hold extreme and hateful views about who becomes afflicted with this "plague".

Whether or not you approve of sex in what ever form it takes, accepted or illicit, the rule remains that government can't legislate social behaviors. Educational programs also make very slow ingress in changing risky behavior because the human sex drive is fundamental; we are all sexual beings.

In all the years so much money has been thrown at HIV/AIDS so little seems to address prevention, and so little seems to address things outside of the anti-retroviral drugs. Attempts to develop vaccines fail, and to us this is no surprise because the germ theory is truly vacuous.

Anti-retroviral drugs have problems. They have side effects and they are very costly. They don't always reach the people who may need them because of politics. The reliance on them as the only viable treatment narrows the window of creative thinking about how something else or a different treatment approach might be as, or more, effective in treatment or cure.

I retain hope that the foundations will come to support efforts that offer more in the way of hope and cure. This includes Bill Gates, Oprah, Rosie, BONO, Sir Elton and others who give money for more and more research.

Sometimes more research ends up being just that. And it becomes money for nothing and a pay check for a researcher. Researchers are like planners. The outcome leads to the question, "Where's the beef?" Just like cancer.

For a number of years I have served as a medical advisory board member for Keep Hope Alive (KHA).

This organization has done a lot of work in an effort to help people around the world deal with HIV/AIDS and has come up with many creative approaches to care.

KHA reported some years ago about manganese and selenium, thymus support to raise cell counts and other more natural things that have helped many people. They also encourage a whole food and organic food plan.

Other people have looked at the science in a different was as well and have suggested that four simple nutrients have a major impact on this health problem.

A few years ago I stumbled across one of those creative ideas. It made so much scientific sense to me, based on my understanding of physiology, that I wondered why more people did not know of this information.

I started sending the data out to as many people as possible and put the information in my newsletter, on this blog, and tried to get it out to other venues in an effort to spread the word.

Now today there's an article about selenium. Maybe someone is paying attention and there's a tiny opening that is starting to let a bit of light shine in on this problem.

Selenium May Slow March Of AIDS

ScienceDaily (2008-11-29) -- Increasing the production of naturally occurring proteins that contain selenium in human blood cells slows down multiplication of the AIDS virus, according to biochemists. ... > read full article

I'd like that light to shine on some who have proposed orthomolecular treatments.

The results are more likely to get good outcomes and cure.

These nutrients, like selenium that has been know to be effective in any viral attack - in the form of seleno-methionene - is a first step. It is also not expensive. The use of sodium selenite in the referenced study at Penn State is not the most beneficial form of selenium but it is the cheapest.

HIV/AIDS "Appears to be due to a deficiency of glutathione peroxidase, which contains selenium and three amino acids. If a person with AIDS is given these four essential nutrients and recovers, it is logical to assume that the deficiency of these factors induced by the virus has been corrected, and even though the virus is still present it no longer has the same pathological effect on the body. In other words, the symptoms of AIDS may be due more to a deficiency of the essential nutrients like selenium than they are to the presence of the virus.

Glutathione peroxidase is selenium, as stated above, plus the amino acids cysteine, glutamate and glycine. Glutathione plays a role in nutrient metabolism, and regulation of cellular events (including gene expression, DNA and protein synthesis, cell growth, and immune response). Glutathione, taken as a supplement, may not be able to cross across the cell membrane, so some believe it is better to consider using acetylcysteine (NAC) and other antioxidants.

Glutathione is found in foods, particularly fruits, vegetables and meats. Cyanohydroxybutene, a chemical found in broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts and cabbage, is also thought to increase glutathione levels. Various herbs -- for instance cinnamon and cardomom -- have compounds that can restore healthy levels of glutathione. Brazil nuts contain a high amount of selenium which can increase glutathione levels. Although glutathione is available in pill form over the counter, its utilization by the body is questionable since we don’t know if it can easily enter cells, even after it is absorbed in the bloodstream.

Brazil nuts: an effective way to improve selenium status.
Am J Clin Nutr. 2008 Feb. Thomson CD, Chisholm A, McLachlan SK, Campbell JM. Department of Human Nutrition, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand.
We investigated the efficacy of Brazil nuts in increasing selenium status in comparison with selenomethionine. Participants consumed 2 Brazil nuts thought to provide approximately 100 mug Selenium, 100 mug Selenium as selenomethionine, or placebo daily for 12 wk. Actual intake from nuts averaged 53 mug Selenium /d (possible range: 20-84 mug Se). Plasma selenium and plasma and whole blood glutathione peroxidase activities were measured at baseline and at 2, 4, 8, and 12 wk, and effects of treatments were compared. Plasma selenium increased by 64%, 61%, and 7%; plasma glutathione peroxidase by 8%, 3%, and -1%; and whole blood glutathione peroxidase by 13%, 5%, and 1.9% in the Brazil nut, selenomethionine, and placebo groups, respectively. Consumption of 2 raw Brazil nuts daily is as effective for increasing selenium status and enhancing glutathione peroxidase activity as 100 mug Se as selenomethionine. Inclusion of this high-selenium food in the diet could avoid the need for fortification or supplements to improve selenium status.

Certain nutrients help raise tissue levels of glutathione including acetylcysteine antioxidant, methyl donors such as choline, DMG and TMG, alpha lipoic acid, polyphenols such as Pycnogenol, and vitamin B12. The mineral Selenium can increase glutathione levels.

An excellent review article in the April 1998 issue of Alternative Medicine Reviews summarizes the known effects of acetylcysteine. The author writes, “N-acetylcysteine is an excellent source of sulfhydryl groups, and is converted in the body into metabolites capable of stimulating glutathione synthesis, promoting detoxification, and acting directly as a free radical scavenger. Administration of acetylcysteine has historically been as a mucolytic [mucus dissolving] agent in a variety of respiratory illnesses; however, it appears to also have beneficial effects in conditions characterized by decreased glutathione or oxidative stress, such as HIV infection, cancer, heart disease, and cigarette smoking.”

Caution: Frequent use of acetaminophen (Tylenol) depletes glutathione peroxidase levels.

Others that support this approach include the work of Harold Foster, a Canadian. An article about his work on AIDS was published in WellBeing Journal.

Another person I know that has done work with people with HIV/AIDS uses an herbal compound that seems over time to raise CD levels to normal.

So let's shift fear back to the status quo and break out of that existing closed-door mold: For the sake of life.

And if you are seeking high quality pharmaceutical grade supplements, please consider letting us be your supply source.

Politics, HIV/AIDS and GMO Drugs

The AIDS epidemic has been a world wide environmental and public health issue wince the concept was thrown out in the Nixon Administration by Henry Kissinger. It was Kissinger that led the Department of defense to a plan for bio warfare contaminants that have brought about HIV/AIDS issues.

This has been a boon to Big Pharma with an avenue for creating a profit stream with genetically engineered pharmaceuticals. It has become a political issue too as many reports address the difficulty some groups and nations have in obtaining the drugs.

In some way the drugs have helped, in others the drugs have harmed. This is similar to the interferon use that has been problematic for people with Hep C, MS and correlated "auto-immune" disorders.

For some time we have tried to get funding for an approach to HIV/AIDS that involves the use of supplements to prevent the conversion of HIV to AIDS. (Hope Bill and Melinda are reading this; Sir Elton and Oprah too!)

We also would like to see more respect for groups in Africa that are getting very good response to a mixture with garlic, cayenne, and some other natural ingredients. Beet, especially raw grated beet, is an excellent anti-cancer remedy, so it should encourage mainstream medicos to get a little more open-minded on the cultural approach to health care and healing. (Recall that the AIDS vaccine trial failed.)

Others are questioning the SOP. Could this be that there seem to be some anti-HIV/AIDS nutrients that can probably cure the "dis-ease".

There are four and they involve the glutathione peroxidase mechanism. The key core components are selenium, cysteine, glutamine and tryptophan.

Certainly this is a simpler, safer and very less expensive approach. It is not, however, expedient to Big Pharma, Bill Clinton or politics as usual, and perhaps not the UN agendae.

Recently the Well Being Journal, a publication that has printed a number of my articles, reported on this nutritional supplement regimen and its positive effects. You might find the material interesting reading and very useful. (Additional data)

Other non-SOP approaches are retained at Keep Hope Alive, where I have served as a medical advisor.

With all the benefits to so many from orthomolecular approaches over the past 60 or so years things might be opening up as chemical treatments fail and options dwindle to nothing.

This is just one quark of understanding the benefit of Chaos theory as applied to health and healing.

Universal HIV tests would have big impact: studyBy Michael Kahn Michael Kahn, Tue Nov 25, 2008
LONDON (Reuters) – Near-universal HIV tests and immediate drug treatment for people who test positive would almost eliminate transmission of the deadly virus within a decade, a computer model showed on Wednesday.

Doing this would cost more initially but then save money down the road because there would be fewer HIV-infected people to treat, Reuben Granich and colleagues at the World Health Organization wrote in the journal The Lancet.

The researchers emphasized their findings do not represent new WHO policy or any other guidance but rather stand as a call for discussion on how to better tackle the AIDS epidemic and the role of so-called antiretroviral drugs.

"Although other prevention strategies, alone or in combination, could substantially reduce HIV incidence, our model suggests that only universal voluntary HIV testing and immediate initiation of antiretroviral drugs could reduce transmission to the point at which elimination might be feasible by 2020 for a generalized epidemic, such as that in South Africa," they wrote.

Granich and colleagues used data from South Africa as a test case for a generalized epidemic in their model, which assumed all HIV transmission was through heterosexual sex.

This showed that voluntary screening in which at least 90 percent of the population took part, and immediate drug treatment for those testing positive, could reduce HIV transmission by more than 95 percent within 10 years.

The AIDS virus infects an estimated 33 million people globally, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, and has killed 25 million. There is no cure.

The advent in the 1990s of combination drug therapy called highly active antiretroviral therapy, or HAART, has extended the lives of many HIV-infected people, particularly in developed countries.

About 3 million people worldwide had received the drug cocktails by the end of 2007, far short of the estimated 6.7 million infected people still in need of treatment, the researchers added.

There are, of course, drawbacks which the researchers and other scientists pointed out. One is how health systems in poor countries can cope with widespread testing, and whether people can stick to the drugs they must take for life.

"At its best, the strategy would prevent morbidity and mortality for the population, both through better treatment of the individual and reduced spread of HIV," Geoffrey Garnett, a researcher at Imperial College London, wrote in a commentary in The Lancet.

"At its worst, the strategy will involve over-testing, over-treatment, side effects, resistance, and potentially reduced autonomy of the individual in their choices of care."

(Reporting by Michael Kahn; Editing by Will Dunham and Mark Trevelyan)
Copyright © 2008 Reuters Limited

Faulty AIDS policies caused 365,000 early deaths in SAfrica: study

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The failure to provide anti-retrovirals to AIDS patients in South Africa led to the premature deaths of 365,000 people between 2000-2005, according to a new Harvard university study.

Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) said the policies of Thabo Mbeki, who was heavily criticized during his 1999-2008 presidency for the denial of scientific remedies for AIDS, contributed directly to the deaths.

"Many lives were lost because of a failure to accept the use of available (antiretroviral drugs) to prevent and treat HIV/AIDS in a timely manner," researchers said.

Mbeki's health minister, Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, was widely discredited for proposing lemon juice, olive oil, garlic and beetroot as AIDS treatments as the country battled one of the world's worst AIDS epidemics.

Some 5.5 million of the 47 million population are infected by HIV -- over 18 percent of the adult population.

The study, published online last month and available Monday in the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes, said the country lost at least 3.8 million years of life from the 330,000 adults who died for lack of proper treatment and the 35,000 babies who died after they were born with HIV.

For the study's model researchers compared the policies of the South African government with those of neighbouring Botswana and Namibia, which are suffering from comparable epidemics and did enforce a policy of treating patients with appropriate drugs.

According to the World Health Organization, 33 million people around the world are infected with the AIDS virus, mostly in the sub-Sahara Africa.

Some two million people died worldwide of AIDS in 2007.
Copyright © 2008 Agence France Presse

Merck vaccine trail increased infection risk

This article points out vaccine failure. I reported on this blog at the time this report was first made. Now there is room for an update.

This experimental HIV vaccine was a Merck product, not unlike the Gardasil vaccine that is known to have caused death and higher risk of disease, without real promise of effectiveness, and no long term studies.

With advertising and marketing Merck and the FDA have made a killing of sorts, at the bank. This might be a good analogy for those of us that keep trying to explain that vaccines aren't all they are built up to be. They do make people sick.

And here's my opportunity to make another plug for the trial I'd like to run with supplements to show they can stop the conversion of HIV to AIDS.

If Bill Gates won't give me a grant perhaps Merck will. Just wish Sir Elton would read this, I'd like his money better. William and Harry might come through so we can dedicate this to their Mum.

Experimental HIV vaccine may have increased infection risk
Mon Nov 3, 2008
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Trials of a once-promising experimental HIV vaccine were cut short in 2007 because the drug may have increased the likelihood of HIV infection rather than preventing it, according to a new study.

The HIV-1 vaccine, which raised hopes in the fight against AIDS as it was being developed by US pharmaceutical giant Merck and Co., was undergoing second stage trials when the problem was discovered in September 2007, said researchers at the Montpellier Institute of Molecular Genetics in France.

The vaccine relied on a modified form of a common cold virus -- Adenovirus 5 (Ad5) -- to carry elements of HIV (Human immunodeficiency virus) into the body.

The smaller HIV parts, the Merck trials contended, would trigger the human immune system to start fighting off later infection with the virus.

One of main worries about the approach was that widespread immunity to the vaccine might cause the drug to be rejected by the body before an effective anti-HIV response could develop.

But three years after the first trial, researchers discovered that more of the vaccine recipients who had prior immunity to the Ad5 virus had been infected with HIV than those not exposed to the vaccine, according to the study, published online in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.

The presence of long-lasting antibodies specifically catering to the Ad5 virus, generated during natural infections with the common cold, could have altered the response to the HIV vaccine, the study said.

HIV infection spread through cell cultures three times faster in the presence of antibodies from individuals immune to the Ad5 virus, because the HIV virus came in contact with more of its preferred "T" cells -- prompted to grow by the vaccine -- to infect.

The study said the vaccine reached the second phase of its trials because primates, used in the first phase, do not naturally come into contact with the human common cold, so the problem went unrecognized.

The vaccine prototype was tested on 700 HIV-negative persons in five hospitals in South Africa between February and September 2007, in the first clinical HIV trial of its magnitude ever conducted in Africa.

Meanwhile, tests had been conducted since 2004 in the United States, Australia, Peru, Brazil and Puerto Rico.

HIV can lead to acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).

According to the World Health Organization, 33 million people around the world are infected with the AIDS virus, mostly in the sub-Sahara Africa.

Some two million people died worldwide of AIDS in 2007.

Copyright © 2008 Agence France Presse.

AIDS treatment should be started sooner

Bill Gates' foundation recently awarded a grant to a Japanese scientist who hopes to engage mosquitoes in the vaccination of everyone.

When I read the story about these awards I wondered what kind of a crazy idea this is, because just like the fluoridation of municipal water supplies, the concept overlooks informed consent, practicing medicine without a license, and not taking adverse reactions or allergy into consideration.

With AIDS, I am not denying that treatment should start as early as possible, but I'd rather get a grant from Gates to run a trial of my suggestion to provide a set of four nutritional supplements to people with HIV, in an effort to show that this pack prevent the progression from HIV to AIDS.

So Bill, I know I won't have any trouble locating a test group for my project. I'm sure to get cooperation of a supplement company to provide the items needed in the amount needed. Then we can support this research for many more people for a longer time period than in a lab, and most likely get real outcomes and a ton of better health for everyone involved.

Of course if this is too logical for you, I'm sure Bono or some one else would bbe willing to work on my team.

AIDS treatment should be started sooner, study saysMonday, October 27, 2008 By Marilynn Marchione

ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON -- People who have the AIDS virus should start drug treatments sooner than current guidelines recommend, suggests a large new study that could change the care of hundreds of thousands of Americans.

The study found that delaying treatment until a patient's immune system is badly damaged nearly doubles the risk of dying in the next few years compared with patients whose treatment started earlier.

Doctors have thought it would be better to spare patients the side effects of AIDS drugs as long as possible.

"The data are rather compelling that the risk of death appears to be higher if you wait than if you treat," said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which helped pay for the study. The institute is a division of the National Institutes of Health.

If the results prompt doctors to change practice, as Fauci and other AIDS specialists predict, several hundred thousand Americans who are not taking AIDS drugs now would be advised to start.

The study was reported yesterday at an infectious-diseases conference in Washington.

About 56,300 Americans are newly infected with HIV each year. The virus ravages T-cells -- "helper cells" of the immune system that fight off germs. Once that happens, people can fall prey to a host of diseases that prove fatal.

Powerful drug combinations available since the mid-1990s have transformed HIV infection into a manageable chronic condition rather than the death sentence it once was. But the drugs can cause heart and cholesterol problems, diarrhea, nausea and other side effects. They also must be taken faithfully, or resistance develops and the drugs stop working.

That is why guidelines by the government and the International AIDS Society recommend that patients who are not yet having AIDS symptoms delay starting on the drugs until their T-cell counts fall below 350 per cubic millimeter of blood (healthy people have more than 800).

"There was this thinking, maybe the drugs were worse than the disease. If you could wait as long as you possibly could wait, you would have fewer side effects," said Dr. Robert Schooley, infectious-diseases chief at the University of California, San Diego.

The new study is the largest to look at whether that advice is sound. Researchers led by Dr. Mari Kitahata of the University of Washington in Seattle pooled information on 8,374 people in the United States and Canada with T-cell counts of 351 to 500 from 1996 to 2006.

About 30 percent started taking AIDS drugs right away; the rest waited until their T-cell counts fell below 350, as guidelines recommend.

"We found a 70 percent improvement in survival for patients who initiated therapy between 350 and 500" compared with those who waited, Kitahata said.

Two other recent studies found that people who start taking AIDS drugs while their T-cell count is above 350 have a better chance of getting their count back to normal than those who start later. Another key study found that briefly interrupting treatment to give patients "drug holidays" puts them at grave risk.

"These studies have all shown the same thing -- that we were starting too late" and need to keep treatment going once it starts, Schooley said. He helped write the AIDS society guidelines and consults for several companies that make AIDS drugs.

The bigger problem is that as many as a third of people diagnosed with HIV only discover they are infected after their T-cell counts already have fallen below 350 and they have serious complications.

"People are still being tested and identified way too late," said Dr. Daniel Kuritzkes, an AIDS specialist at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. He said the new study shows how important it is to test and find people sooner.