Posts Tagged ‘HIV’

Disparity in population with new cases of HIV/AIDS

Tuesday, May 1st, 2012

A new report from the state health department shows wide disparities among people with HIV/AIDS in Minnesota, with more new cases in 2011 among communities of color, gay and bisexual men and people in their 20s than other groups.

Overall, the number of new HIV cases reported in Minnesota last year fell slightly from the year before, with 292 new cases reported in 2011, or 12 percent less than the 331 cases reported in 2010. There are 7,136 people living with HIV in the state.

Poverty and social factors play a big role in the transmission of HIV, said Peter Carr, STD and AIDS director for the Minnesota Department of Health.

“Access to care, access to prevention services, things that get in the way of people being able to make healthy choices,” Carr said. “There is some really strong and new evidence that suggests that those factors like where you live are as important as anything in determining your health status.”

Where a person lives also factors into the spread of HIV, he said. (more…)

HIV Care System Is Getting Swamped

Friday, March 18th, 2011

The U.S. HIV care system is being swamped by a rising tide of new patients, an Institute of Medicine (IOM) report warns.

As HIV treatment continues to improve, people with HIV are living much longer. Meanwhile, the CDC’s universal HIV screening program is bearing fruit, identifying more people who are infected with the AIDS virus.

The result is a widening gap between the number of Americans with HIV and the resources available to treat them.

“Our system is getting stretched,” IOM panel chair Paul D. Cleary, PhD, dean of the Yale School of Public Health, tells WebMD. “There is going to be a dramatic change in the number of people with HIV detected and cared for. When we start treating this many more people … we find there are barriers to getting them into available treatment facilities.”

Over 20% of the 1.1 million Americans with HIV don’t know they are infected. Learning they have HIV is good for the individual, as earlier treatment means better health. It’s also good for society, as people who know they carry HIV are less likely to infect others — and treatment actually makes a person less infectious.

“There is a moral imperative that if we do testing, we have to get people who test positive into care,” Michael Saag, MD, tells WebMD.

But there’s a raft of problems with actually providing this care, notes Saag, director of AIDS research at the University of Alabama, Birmingham and immediate past president of the HIV Medicine Association.

Saag’s state-of-the-art AIDS clinic is a prime example. In 2000, the clinic was caring for 750 patients. Now the same clinic, with pretty much the same funding and same staff level, is caring for 1,800 patients. (more…)

CDC Urges New HIV Testing for Donors

Friday, March 18th, 2011

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is recommending hospitals test living donors for the virus that causes AIDS no more than seven days before their organs are removed and transplanted, following the first documented U.S. case of HIV transmission from a live organ donor in more than two decades.

According to an investigation by the CDC and New York city and state health officials, a kidney transplant recipient contracted the virus from a donor in an unnamed New York City hospital in 2009. The male donor acknowledged that he had engaged in unprotected sex with another man after he was screened for HIV, but before he donated the organ. The New York hospital tested the donor 79 days before transplant, when he showed no evidence of infection, but did not re-test him closer to the surgery that removed the organ.

The centers’ 1994 guidelines for organ-donor screening, which are being revised, did not address the timing of screening tests.

The CDC is also recommending the use of a test that detects the virus within eight to 10 days of infection.

Of the three major transplant centers serving the city, Mount Sinai Medical Center said the event did not occur there; a spokesman for another, New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center, said, “We don’t have any information about this.” New York University Langone Medical Center said that it would be “inappropriate” to comment. (more…)

HIV increase among county’s young black men prompts CDC to focus on prevention

Friday, February 4th, 2011

A startling increase in the number of reported HIV infections among young black men in Milwaukee County who have sex with men may be linked to several risk factors, including internalized homophobia and living on the streets, according to a joint investigation by local, state and federal health officials released Thursday.

The investigation began after the Wisconsin Division of Public Health noted a 144% increase in reported HIV diagnoses in Milwaukee County from 2000 to 2008 among black men ages 15 to 29 who have sex with men.

The resulting investigation – which involved the state, Milwaukee Health Department and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – found the increase likely wasn’t due to intensified testing efforts, but to increased transmission of HIV through high risk behavior and nondisclosure of HIV status.

If the spike in HIV diagnoses among young black men isn’t reversed, the entire metro area could see increased rates, Milwaukee Health Commissioner Bevan Baker warned Thursday.

A higher percentage of young black males than nonblack males have male sex partners at least five years older, according to the investigation, which involved a sampling of Milwaukee County men with HIV or syphilis diagnoses. Older men are more likely to be infected with HIV.

The Milwaukee Health Department last summer announced a multifaceted strategy to boost HIV testing, reduce stigma in the community and teach men to protect themselves.

The city partnered with Diverse & Resilient, an organization that works to improve the public health of lesbian, gay, transgender and bisexual individuals. That group networked with multiple other community groups and the medical community. It has trained 60 men to help provide information to the targeted population. (more…)

A/H1N1 deaths rise to 26 in American

Thursday, June 4th, 2009

HOUSTON, June 3 (Xinhua) — Four states on Wednesday reported five deaths related to the A/H1N1 flu virus, bringing the number of total deaths related to the virus to 26 in the United States, according to local health officials.

Michigan and Connecticut are the latest two states which reported their first deaths on Wednesday.

The Michigan Department of Community Health has confirmed that the state’s first death of A/H1N1 flu involved a 53-year-old woman, who died on Tuesday in a hospital in Macomb County after being sick for more than two weeks.

“This is sad and unfortunate. But, at the same time, we do expect a number of deaths (nationally) following the infection from this virus,” James McCurtis, a spokesman for the department, said on Wednesday.

As of Wednesday, Michigan reported 298 confirmed cases of A/H1N1 flu statewide, comparing to 287 cases released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on its website. (more…)

Sanofi has winning cancer drug, but short patent

Monday, June 1st, 2009

LONDON (Reuters) – Sanofi-Aventis may have bagged a winning cancer drug when it agreed to buy privately held BiPar Sciences for up to $500 million in April, but a short patent could limit the French group’s scope to cash in on sales.

BiPar’s BSI-201 has emerged as one of the most promising new products at this year’s ASCO cancer conference in Orlando, Florida, with positive mid-stage trial results helping lift Sanofi shares by more than 3 percent on Monday.

But there is a fly in the ointment. A Sanofi spokesman said on Monday that the main U.S. composition patent on the medicine was valid only until 2013, though this could be extended by five years.

In Europe, the patent runs to 2014 and Sanofi will have 10 years data exclusivity after approval.

“These facts probably explain the relatively modest agreed price for the BiPar deal,” analysts at Morgan Stanley said in a research note.

They estimate BSI-201 could sell between $1 billion and $4 billion a year to Sanofi’s 2016 revenues, with a U.S. launch as possible by late 2010.

On the face of it, that makes the price Sanofi’s new chief executive, Chris Viehbacher, paid for BiPar seem a bargain. The problem is the medicine could face generic competition in the world’s biggest pharmaceuticals market from 2018.

BSI-201 belongs to a new class of drugs that block a cell repair enzyme known as PARP.

It impressed doctors at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) on Sunday by improving survival by 60 percent compared with chemotherapy alone for women with tough-to-treat “triple negative breast cancer.”

Patients with triple negative metastatic breast cancer have tumors that do not express the hormones oestrogen or progesterone, as well as the protein HER-2.

These women, who account for 15 to 20 percent of breast cancer patients, have a very aggressive form of disease and there are currently no treatments other than chemotherapy.

Citigroup analyst Mark Dainty said the data for BSI-201 was significantly better than the results with Roche’s Avastin in triple negative patients and the new drug could put 20 to 25 percent of Avastin sales forecasts at risk.

Citi currently forecasts 2011 Avastin breast cancer sales at 1.7 billion Swiss francs ($1.6 billion) and losing 20 percent of this would slice some 2 percent off Roche’s 2011 earnings per shares.

AstraZeneca also has an experimental PARP inhibitor called olaparib that is further behind in development.

Mesothelioma

Thursday, May 21st, 2009

Mesothelioma is a form of cancer that is almost always caused by exposure to asbestos. In this disease, malignant cells develop in the mesothelium, a protective lining that covers most of the body’s internal organs. Its most common site is the pleura (outer lining of the lungs and internal chest wall), but it may also occur in the peritoneum (the lining of the abdominal cavity), the heart,[1] the pericardium (a sac that surrounds the heart) or tunica vaginalis.

Most people who develop mesothelioma have worked on jobs where they inhaled asbestos particles, or they have been exposed to asbestos dust and fiber in other ways. Washing the clothes of a family member who worked with asbestos can also put a person at risk for developing mesothelioma.[2] Unlike lung cancer, there is no association between mesothelioma and smoking, but smoking greatly increases risk of other asbestos-induced cancer.[3] Compensation via asbestos funds or lawsuits is an important issue in mesothelioma (see asbestos and the law).

The symptoms of mesothelioma include shortness of breath due to pleural effusion (fluid between the lung and the chest wall) or chest wall pain, and general symptoms such as weight loss. The diagnosis may be suspected with chest X-ray and CT scan, and is confirmed with a biopsy (tissue sample) and microscopic examination. A thoracoscopy (inserting a tube with a camera into the chest) can be used to take biopsies. It allows the introduction of substances such as talc to obliterate the pleural space (called pleurodesis), which prevents more fluid from accumulating and pressing on the lung. Despite treatment with chemotherapy, radiation therapy or sometimes surgery, the disease carries a poor prognosis. Research about screening tests for the early detection of mesothelioma is ongoing.

Signs and symptoms
Symptoms of mesothelioma may not appear until 20 to 50 years after exposure to asbestos. Shortness of breath, cough, and pain in the chest due to an accumulation of fluid in the pleural space are often symptoms of pleural mesothelioma.

Symptoms of peritoneal mesothelioma include weight loss and cachexia, abdominal swelling and pain due to ascites (a buildup of fluid in the abdominal cavity). Other symptoms of peritoneal mesothelioma may include bowel obstruction, blood clotting abnormalities, anemia, and fever. If the cancer has spread beyond the mesothelium to other parts of the body, symptoms may include pain, trouble swallowing, or swelling of the neck or face.

These symptoms may be caused by mesothelioma or by other, less serious conditions.

Mesothelioma that affects the pleura can cause these signs and symptoms:

chest wall pain
pleural effusion, or fluid surrounding the lung
shortness of breath
fatigue or anemia
wheezing, hoarseness, or cough
blood in the sputum (fluid) coughed up (hemoptysis)
In severe cases, the person may have many tumor masses. The individual may develop a pneumothorax, or collapse of the lung. The disease may metastasize, or spread, to other parts of the body.

Tumors that affect the abdominal cavity often do not cause symptoms until they are at a late stage. Symptoms include:

abdominal pain
ascites, or an abnormal buildup of fluid in the abdomen
a mass in the abdomen
problems with bowel function
weight loss
In severe cases of the disease, the following signs and symptoms may be present:

blood clots in the veins, which may cause thrombophlebitis
disseminated intravascular coagulation, a disorder causing severe bleeding in many body organs
jaundice, or yellowing of the eyes and skin
low blood sugar level
pleural effusion
pulmonary emboli, or blood clots in the arteries of the lungs
severe ascites
A mesothelioma does not usually spread to the bone, brain, or adrenal glands. Pleural tumors are usually found only on one side of the lungs.