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How many times have you started to have a conversation with someone about Hepatitis C only to have it blow up in your face? Have you ever heard someone say something about Hep C that didn't seem quite right to you? You were probably right something was amiss. A discussion about Hepatitis C can...
As per Wikipedia, the definition of a stigma is as follows: "Stigma is a word that originally means a "sign", "point", or "branding mark"." Wikipedia goes on to call stigma "A badge of shame, a physical mark of infamy or disgrace." Damn that w...
Recently, the CDC (Center for Disease Control) issued a statement that all Baby Boomers should be tested for Hepatitis C. The question often comes up as to why this particular segment of people is so vulnerable. What does being born between 1945 and 1965 have to do with Hepatitis C? What was di...
Buyer Beware! There are several snake oil salesmen out there who are claiming to have cured their own Hepatitis C with herbs, supplements and parking lot gravel. Okay, maybe not the parking lot gravel but it might as well be. What you need to remember is that there are two different types of...
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Uganda started its Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission of HIV program in 2000. However, twelve years later, 65 babies are being born daily infected with HIV, 80,000 children living with HIV are not accessing ARVs though they are readily available in the country.
"Two years from today, half of these children will be dead if not identified and started on treatment," said Sarah Kataike, the Minister of State for Health, General Duties at the opening of the 6th National Peadiatric HIV conference in Kampala, on Wednesday this week.
Kataike attributed this tragedy to the fact that interventions have not been scaled up to achieve public health impact.
"To achieve elimination of HIV in children- at least 90% of women and their children should access these services," she said.
The new Uganda AIDS Indicators' Survey 2011, HIV prevalence has increased to 7.3%. There are 130,000 new HIV infections in the country every year.
HIV prevalence is highest among women at 8.3% while it is 6.1% among men. Urban women have a higher prevalence at 11% than their rural counterparts at 8%. However there are no urban-rural differences among the men.
Kataike noted that Mother to Child Transmission of HIV was the second most common cause of infection but added that World Health Organisation had provided evidence that ARV given early to HIV positive pregnant women and throughout the breastfeeding period, eliminate HIV in children.
It is for this reason that the government is rolling out a new strategy code-named Option B+ in an effort to eliminate Mother to Child Transmission of HIV by 2015.
Launching the strategy at the conference, First Lady Janet Museveni called for a return to the multi sectoral approach Uganda used to implement the ABC strategy of Abstinence, Faithfulness in marriage and Condom use in the 1990s.
The strategy successfully brought down HIV prevalence however, the First Lady said, it was met with resistance.
"Many voices stopped us. They said that by promoting abstinence and faithfulness, we were not being practical. The loud noise could not allow us to go on," she said adding, "if we had not stopped we would have had an affordable way of preventing our children from infection."
She said that we now have to learn the hard way.
"If HIV is stopped in families, children will be safe," she said.
Mrs Museveni emphasised the importance of involving all stakeholders to achieve success.
"There was a time when we were leading the struggle. We should not get to 2015 with HIV prevalence in Uganda going up and not down, she said.
Musa Bungudu, the UNAIDs country director said development partners were joining Uganda to get it to zero HIV infections but he noted there had to be zero corruption to progress.
He noted that Uganda has made many achievements but it is the only country in Sub Saharan Africa and only one of two in Africa where new infections are going up.
He recommended the direct implementation of Option B+ as a way of curbing new infections among babies born to infected mothers.
Option B+ is a regimen where all HIV positive pregnant mothers are given ARVs from three and a half months of pregnancy regardless of their CD4 count, throughout pregnancy, labour, breastfeeding and for life. The babies are also given ARVs up to six weeks.
The new regimen is recommended by WHO to eliminate MTCT of HIV.
"It is easy to administer," said Hon Kataike. "A mother will take one pill a day from pregnancy through life," she added.
She revealed that the US government had provided funds to support the programme for the first year.
Hon Kataike underscored the importance of the households and communities in achieving health. She noted the critical role men played and that they needed to be brought on board.
She appealed to the education sector to ensure that infected children are not stigmatised in school.
Speaking at the same function, the US ambassador, H.E. Scott DeLiSi announced that US had increased funding for PMTCT by USD25million bringing up its contribution to USD40million.
"Our commitment is deep, strong and enduring. The people of the United States of America will keep the commitment to Uganda," he said.
Please sign the ATC Salvage Therapy Petition Join us in asking Congressman Alcee Hastings and Congresswomen Maxine Waters to send a ‘Dear Colleague’ letter to Anthony Fauci, Director of NIAID, asking for the federal facilitation of apricitabine (ATC). ATC is a phase III nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor (NRTI) that has been shown to be safe and effective in treating people with HIV. It works against viruses that are resistant to several other nukes and could ...
Researchers from Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, the University of Mississippi Medical Center and the University of Massachusetts Medical School announced today at CROI2013 the discovery of the first infant functionally cured of HIV. The baby, a female now two and a half years old, received 3 HIV medications when brought to the hospital at 30 hours old. Viral load tests were performed during the first few weeks that showed a rapidly decreasing viral load which reached ...
At the 19th International AIDS Conference (AIDS 2012) in Washington D.C., the CDC reported that only 1 out of 4 HIV patients in the U.S. have HIV under control, which is defined as complete viral suppression. Warning bells should be ringing in the scientific and HIV advocacy communities. While much progress has been made in the last three decades in the treatment of HIV, tens of thousands of people living with HIV (PLWH) are currently struggling to construct viable treat...
Paige Rawl is 17 and HIV positive, but while her life has been shaped by HIV it isn't ruled by it. When Paige Rawl starts her senior year at Indianapolis’s Herron High School next month, she'll be cheer captain and a member of the student government and prom committee. This summer, the 17-year-old held down a part-time job at Hollister, hawking the popular Southern California-inspired clothing brand. The all-American girl — who happens to be HIV positive. Paige was in...
The HIV community has been abuzz with the August FDA approval of what had been termed “the Quad”, the second one-pill-once-a-day combination antiretroviral drug. Marketed by Gilead under the name Stribild, the drug contains two NRTIs (tenofovir and emtricitabine), an integrase inhibitor (elvitegravir) and an integrase booster (cobicistat) and is approved for use in treatment naïve patients with either drug resistant or wild type virus. In comparison to Atripla, the first...
Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (NYSE: BMY) today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a supplemental new drug application (sNDA) for SUSTIVA® (efavirenz), including dosing recommendations for...
California and other states would be pressured to amend or repeal criminal laws that single out HIV-positive people under a bipartisan bill co-authored and introduced this week by Rep. Barbara...
Mission Statement
At HIV Haven we wish to provide our readers with vital cutting edge information to help expand HIV knowledge and promote activism, particularly that which works towards an end to the HIV pandemic. It is our desire to bring to you the scientific, medical and social advances that given the appropriate attention and support, could change the course of the HIV pandemic, lessen the devastating effects of HIV and AIDS, better the quality and quantity of life for people living with HIV and even yield an eventual end to the HIV pandemic. We also provide the basics of HIV transmission and treatment.
We will focus on issues such as innovative drug development, strategic activist campaigns, HIV relationships and novel HIV and HIV cure research. We also will bring you advances in Hepatitis C (HCV), a common HIV co-infection. Whether you are living with HIV/AIDS, HIV and HCV, love someone who is, are an activist, advocate, researcher, physician or just an interested party, we hope here at HIV Haven we can help you find what you are looking for.
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