Uganda: Texts HIV Education

Valentine's Day is synonymous with romance and love, now in Uganda it means HIV education through cell phone texts. Three organizations joined forces on February 14th to inform Ugandan youths in Mbarara about HIV: Text to Change (TTC), the AIDS Information Center and mobile phone company Celtel Uganda. The initiative hopes to appeal largely to young Ugandans and text messages supply health information and HIV awareness.

Daily Monitor

Increasing HIV Infections: A Big Windfall for Big Pharma

HIV patients in the United States are apparently surviving longer due to less complicated-to-take and less immediately toxic anti-hiv drugs. Increasing patient lifespan on necessary anti-hiv medication equals sustained sales of the drugs. This along with repeated failures to find an HIV vaccine, and new unexpected increases of hiv positive populations in certain communities has been a boon to HIV-drug makers. Gilead Sciences Inc., of California, produces the most prescribed anti-hiv drug in the country, Atripla. Gilead supplies Atripla to over half of HIV positive patients in the US. Its sales are expected to reach $1billion this year alone.

Los Angeles Times

Ghana Seeks to Praise Legitimate Herbal Healers and Differentiate from Opportunistic Quacks

Professor F. T. Sai, the Presidential Advisor on Reproductive Health, HIV/AIDS, in Ghana, announced he is open to accepting and funding legitimate research organizations who provide proof of their substantial research into the effective use of evidence-based herbal medicines to fight the HIV/AIDS scourge. He aims to distinguish true healers with solid research from those opportunistic healers selling snake-oils to the sick and desperate. The Ghana AIDS Commission (GAC) wants to bring Traditional Herbal Practitioners and modern medicine together into a Complementary arsenal to battle the scourge of HIV/AIDS.

ALL AFRICA

HIV+ African Women Benefit from Probiotics

A new joint study by researchers from the University of Benin, Benson Idahosa University, and the Canadian Research and Development Centre for Probiotics at the University of Western Ontario has found probiotics to ease symptoms of nausea, flatulence, and diarrhea experienced by some HIV+ Nigerian people in Sub-Saharan Africa who were not taking unavailable anti-retroviral drugs or other supplements. Two equal groups of twelve female study participants aged 18-44 with moderate diarrhea were given 100mL per day of either normal yogurt or probiotic boosted yogurt for a 15 day period. Normal yogurt contained Lactobacillus delbruekii var bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus while the probiotically boosted yogurt was fermented with Lactobacillus rhamnosus GR-1 and L. reuteri RC-14. Results from the study showed that all 12 women in the probiotic-boosted study group had a resolution of their symptoms, while only 2 out of the 12 in the normal yogurt group experienced resolution. Moreover, 92% of the probiotically-boosted wing of the study maintained average CD4 cell counts, compared to only 25% of the normal yogurt group. Researchers also found that overall white blood cells counts of the probiotic-boosted yogurt increased after 15 days of supplementation and decreased to below baseline 15 days after discontinuing the study. Earlier studies yielded positive results in alleviating diarrhea and preventing gastrointestinal infections in animal infants when their diets were supplemented with Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG. This supplementation protected the infants from rotaviral diarrhea after infection with the rotavirus.

Food Navigator Europe

Discrimination for HIV+ Nigerian Police Recruits

Twenty-six Nigerian Police recruits in Lagos were expelled from Nigeria’s Kaduna Police College when administrators learned the recruits were infected. Local activists from the Kaduna state Civil Society on HIV/AIDS in Nigeria (CISHAN) are demanding the reinstatement of the 19 women and 7 men who were expelled. The Police College's Commandant denies any wrong-doing or discrimination in the matter and pleads ignorance of the recruits HIV statuses. “Nobody told them they had HIV/AIDS,” said Commandant Ado “I only told them that they had some medical predicament.”

All Africa

New Thoughts and Evidence of Probiotics Benefiting HIV+ populations

Tony Lance unleashed a revelationary paper on the benefits of a high probiotic diet to HIV+ populations. His paper, edited by Dr. Henry Bauer, Dr. Rebecca Culshaw and Darin Brown, highlights intestinal microflora's role in immune modulation and underscores how an imbalance in the gut microflora can lead to GUT DYSBIOSIS which can lead to AIDS-like disease. He supports his theory by referencing

Dr. Kingsley Anukam, a Canada-
based African researcher, published a study in the Journal of
Gastroenterology which found that probiotic supplementation relieved
diarrhea in “HIV+” women and stabilized CD4 counts. He wrote, “This is
the first study to show the benefits of probiotic yogurt on quality of life of
women in Nigeria with HIV/AIDS, and suggests that perhaps a simple
fermented food can provide some relief in the management of the AIDS
epidemic in Africa” (75).

Mr. Lance's article GRID = Gay Related Intestinal Dysbiosis?
Explaining HIV/AIDS Paradoxes in Terms of Intestinal Dysbiosis


can be accessed and downloaded from Dr. Henry Bauer's Blog

The Nigerian research data

Anukam K et al. Yogurt containing probiotic Lactobacillus rhamnosus GR-1 and L.
reuteri RC-14 helps resolve moderate diarrhea and increases CD4 count in HIV/AIDS
patients. Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology. Published online ahead of print, Jan.2008; can be accessed here.

The application and study of probiotics in HIV+ populations in Nigeria would be an ideal opportunity for CAMI to provide substantial impact into the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

This is why CAMI is VITAL to HUMAN SURVIVAL!!!

Tony Fauci of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) talked about pathogenesis as the bedrock of information from which all advances in treatment, prevention, and, ultimately, vaccine development springs. He made the point that "for every person put on treatment, six more are infected," indicating that treatment is unsustainable on a global scale. With regard to prevention he said there was "an awful lot to do," with less than 10% of individuals at risk of HIV infection currently able to access prevention programs, and said that "half of the 60 million HIV infections that we project will occur by 2015 could be averted with a comprehensive scale up of proven prevention strategies." Fauci then talked about the evolving concept of an AIDS vaccine, and said there was some optimism that a "less than perfect vaccine" can be developed that will not prevent infection but instead lower viral set-point, prevent disease progression, and lower the risk of transmission to others.

International AIDS Vaccine Initiative IAV

Study: Gel fails to stop HIV infection

Promising Anti-HIV fails. Researchers consider blaming research participants for not using it correctly.

Yahoo News